Perspective: How Do We Keep the Middle Class From Dropping Out?

As mentioned in an earlier blog, the Middle Class in the United States achieved an historic wage earning level after WWII because the US had the only manufacturing capability on the planet unscathed from the War. Today, about 20 million Americans, mostly in the Middle Class, are out of work or working part time. It is worse than these numbers show because most of these people have skills that no longer meet the current global and digital market needs.

This shows up in the numbers. The most recent jobs report states that last month about a half a million potential workers stopped looking for work, and as a consequence, the jobless rate dropped. Based on this math, one would assume that the answer is to have all who can’t find work to stop looking. This would drive the unemployed percent to zero. Then we could forget all about the problem!

Or could we? Those in the Middle Class that stop looking for work altogether will just end up in another group, namely those classified as disabled and are thus obtaining Social Security or those who are considered poor and are obtaining food stamps and all the rest of government handouts. Obama claims that these unemployed are being exploited. Nevertheless, he does nothing tangible about their plight except to preach that they can “pull themselves up by their boot straps, if only the rich will provide the boots”. Can we stand to have the Middle Class be dependent upon the government? Worse, can we afford to have them drop out? Of course not!

Those who have been reading my blogs know that I believe we have our priorities all wrong. Contrary to what the environmental enthusiasts tell us, our lifestyle will not cause the world to collapse within our lifetime, but I can assure you that if the problem of how to help our Middle Class is not seriously addressed and soon, the cost of supporting them and their children and their children’s children will permanently harm the lifestyle we have all come to love.

As an historic fact, jobs for the under skilled have been shrinking during the past 100 years. Farm labor, for example has dropped from 33% of the total labor force to less than 2 % today. By contrast professional and skilled labor has increased to 70 % of the total work force. Because of the digital revolution and the robotization it brings with it, we can expect the skilled class to increase to about 75 to 80% while non-skilled labor shrinks to about 20-25% of the total work force.

Interestingly, jobs that require high skills are increasing faster than we are graduating those with the skills in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) which are required for the jobs. The number of these jobs is expanding rapidly because the digital revolution is now upon us in full force. A new factor in this equation is that manufacturing jobs that moved overseas are beginning to return to the US. It turns out that manufacturing is most efficient when located in the same proximity as design, engineering and marketing. Also, the cost of overseas labor is rising, and the cost of shipping is also rising due to rising oil prices.

Another factor affecting high tech jobs is the extremely low cost of ethane. This is a component of natural gas and a major building block for chemicals and polymers. Consequently, major chemical manufacturers are lured to build plants in the US. The group includes Dow and Shell, major US companies, but it also includes BASF, a German company, which is the world’s largest chemical manufacturer. As an aside, let me mention that these plants will hire many chemical engineers at starting salaries above $100,000 per annum.

In a sentence, we have a dilemma: We have a shortage of jobs for the unskilled workers, and a shortage of workers for the skilled jobs. This has happened so swiftly that the economy and the Middle Class have been unable to adjust to it.

The fact is we are experiencing a paradigm shift in the type of skills required to meet the market needs as the chart graphically illustrates.

                                                                              PERCENT OF US LABOR MARKET.



                                                                                         1910                            2010

Unskilled, or Low Skilled

Farm Labor                                                                         33                                 2

Other Labor                                                                        15                                  8

Operators, Foremen, Craftsmen                                          25                                 20

Sub-Total                                                                           73                                 30



Professional, Managerial, Clerical, Marketing                      27                                  70



Source: Occupational changes during the twentieth century

Ian D. Wyatt and Daniel E. Hecker



Looking at these data tells us that we have been moving from a society that functioned very well with low skilled labor to one where modern technology and even robots require highly skilled workers. In the early part of the 20th century, a one-room school six or eight grade education was all that was needed to get a decent job. But in the 21st century, a High School education may not be enough. A Trade School, Junior College and in many cases, even a College degree is required to obtain a job of “American Dream” quality..

You do not have to be an Einstein to know what is in the immediate future. Just look in your child’s hand and you will find a device that seems to be affixed to as though from birth. This amazing device reminds us old folks of the radio wrist watch of Dick Tracy days. In a way the Smart Phone is in fact a kind of two-way radio. But it is infinitely more than that! It permits the owner, even a child, to access the entire world’s knowledge on any subject in a matter of seconds. Contrast this to what the the kid had access to in the one-room school with one teacher teaching 8 grades. But the wonderment of it is that it is predicted that these so-called “phones, a mere five years old, will be in the hands of five billion earth dwellers within the next ten years. What else do we need to know to realize where this is heading at mach speed?

So, what in the face of this dramatic change in the workplace can be done to help the Middle Class to get back to work right now? Fortuitously, we have the opportunity and the need for a large amount of such under-skilled labor because of the discovery of the huge quantities of natural gas and oil right here in our back yard. To get this low cost product to market requires massive amounts of infrastructure that does not exist.. This includes piping the products to users such as the chemical and electricity producers and to export markets. Piping is also needed to get the gas to locations where it can be used for automotive fuel. This fuel, called compressed natural gas CNG, is already being used in trucks and busses, but the shortage of infrastructure to create the CNG and get the refueling facilities in place is slowing the adoption of this low-cost, environmentally friendly automotive fuel. And as the March 23rd article in the Olean Times explains, the shortage of infrastructure is showing up right here.

“The biggest drawback to the use of compressed natural gas (CNG) is that while there is an estimated 10,000 vehicles in the State of New York capable of using CNG -10% of the vehicles in the Nation- there are only about 100 CNG refueling stations in the State, and one-third of those are public”

The work to build this infrastructure does not require a college degree. Mostly it requires know-how that the jobless already have. Therefore this group of workers could begin work at once.

To increase the number of persons who are skilled in STEM is another matter. Two actions are required.

• Find a way to convince females who represent half of college graduates to take and graduate with        majors in STEM. Currently, the percentage is only about 5%

• Change the immigration policy so that foreign students who major in STEM can stay and work in the United States.

As stated at the beginning of this blog, our priorities are out of whack. The idea that our infrastructure of roads and schools must be fixed as a priority is silly. We have had one major bridge collapse in the last ten years with minimal damage to human life. And we do not see traffic backed up because the roads are crumbling and therefore impassable. Another silly idea is that we have to spend billions on new pre-school programs. We know from Head Start that the kids who are not in that program reach equality with those who are in about 1-3 years. We have always known what to do to improve our schools and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s study has confirmed it! The schools need two things, namely, a good teacher and a good parent. The way the Foundation determined who was a good teacher was to ask the students. As a former student, I am shocked, shocked to just now learn that students know which teachers are good and which were not!

Now, you would think that the US Government would leap at this once in a lifetime opportunity to do something special to help the Middle Class. Unfortunately however, based on the way our governmental leaders talk and act and the low priority they have given this problem, one has to assume that they have no clue what is going on and what has to be done about it. Maybe we should give them Dick Tracy watches.

Perspective: Easter Bunny Banned in District Schools

News Item:

"The Indian River School District’s concern over issues of religious expression in the schools — a matter discussed and debated for the past three years — reached new heights this week when officials mandated on Tuesday that no school in the district can host or celebrate the Easter holiday with egg hunts, candy or the Easter Bunny, etc.The recommendation was made at the suggestion of the district’s administrative superintendent, Susan Bunting, on strong advice from attorney Jason Gosselin. It follows a recent partial legal settlement, announced at last month’s school board meeting, that was an attempt to bring the district’s policy on religion “more in line with the U.S. Constitution” after two Jewish families filed suit claiming the district had pursued pro-Christian policies."

Exactly what does the Constitution say about this?

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”.

Wow! That is a new one!! Celebrating a religion is equal to Establishing a religion! Letting the Bunny into the school is tantamount to the government establishing a religion? How scaring can it get? But hey, if the Jews are so upset, why not give their “Jewish Bunny” equal time? Oh, by the way, did you know that Easter is not even mentioned in the Bible?

This would be hilarious and just the stuff for Saturday Night Live, if it were not so serious. But the Controllers and kill-joys just can’t leave us alone. As Ronald Regan would say, “There they go again”!

Let me ask you to imagine that you knew nothing about Easter and then were told that every child believed that they if they put fancy baskets in the right place on a designated night in Spring then a bunny rabbit could lay decorated eggs in them and put candy in, as well. You are correct! You would surely want to ban such a practice straight away to prevent the child from growing up a complete loony. And what if they wanted to bring that filled basket to school to show their friends? Oh, my God!!!

If Easter is not found in the Bible, then where did it come from? Now, wouldn’t this be a perfect question for school children to ask? Is it too much to ask that a school board president, a superintendent, a principal and a teacher know that we live in an age when we have all the knowledge the entire world has ever known right in the palm of our hand where in a matter of minutes we can learn the truth about any subject? And would not this be the perfect time to have the kids use the I-phone they have glued to their hands and get them to stop texting with it long enough to look up the origin of Easter?

When I heard about the controversy over the celebration of Easter, I immediately grabbed our I-Pad to look up the origin of Easter, and in about three minutes found the following, which I quote verbatim:

“Spring is in the air! Flowers and bunnies decorate the home. Father helps the children paint beautiful designs on eggs dyed in various colors. These eggs, which will later be hidden and searched for, are placed into lovely, seasonal baskets. The wonderful aroma of the hot cross buns mother is baking in the oven waft through the house. Forty days of abstaining from special foods will finally end the next day. The whole family picks out their Sunday best to wear to the next morning’s sunrise worship service to celebrate the savior’s resurrection and the renewal of life. Everyone looks forward to a succulent ham with all the trimmings. It will be a thrilling day. After all, it is one of the most important religious holidays of the year.” Easter, right?

“Wrong This is a description of an ancient Babylonian family—2,000 years before Christ—honoring the resurrection of their god, Tammuz, who was brought back from the underworld by his mother/wife, Ishtar (after whom the festival was named). As Ishtar was actually pronounced “Easter” in most Semitic dialects, it could be said that the event portrayed here is, in a sense, Easter.”

“Of course, the occasion could easily have been a Phrygian family honoring Attis and Cybele, or perhaps a Phoenician family worshipping Adonis and Astarte. Also fitting the description well would be an Israelite family honoring the Canaanite Baal and Ashtoreth. Or this depiction could just as easily represent any number of other fertility celebrations of death and resurrection—including the modern Easter celebration as it has come to us through the Anglo-Saxon fertility rites of the goddess Eostre or Ostara. These are all the same festivals, separated only by time and culture.”

In other words, this yearly event has been celebrated for thousands of years by nearly every group on the globe as a fun time. The timing connects with the ending of Winter and the beginning of new life at Spring. So why not celebrate with all the humans on the planet who have done so for millennia?

The problem is worse in the first six grades. First the schools dropped recess and found that the boys had to be given Ritalin. Then the Christmas tree was tossed out of the school, and now the Easter Bunny must go. How boring do we want our elementary schools to be? If the kill-joys are permitted to go on like this, children will have no fun in school at all! Hasn’t anyone noticed that our kids spend more time texting than having fun with other kids doing silly things such as playing tag, decorating Christmas trees and showing off their Easter baskets? And you wonder why the drop out rate is high? As Sherlock Holmes would say: “It’s elementary (school) dear Watson.

How about this for an answer for the school board president? If these controllers won’t let your school teach religion, maybe they will permit you to teach history? If our schools are truly interested in educating our children (versus indoctrinating them) but cannot teach anything about religion, why not let them teach that mankind has been celebrating the spring equinox for as far back as history has been recorded? Moreover, is it too much to ask that our teachers, administrators and school boards have enough courage and be creative enough to get around these “controllers”? Now, here’s an idea!! Replace the word Easter with it’s ancient (i.e. historic) predecessor, Ishtar and go right on with the Ishtar bunnies, Ishtar eggs, Ishtar baskets and Ishtar egg hunts!

PERSPECTIVE: MANUFACTURING AND THE MIDDLE CLASS

President Obama constantly tells us that the “Middle Class” is in terrible shape and the people who qualify as middle class must be helped in every way possible with US government financial support. His idea is that the middle class is in such bad shape that we must take money away from those who could invest capital to make jobs for the middle class and instead just give that money to the so-called Middle Class.

Now, if Obama were really serious about helping the middle class, he might have noticed the Marcellus Shell development which will provide us with an abundant supply of the lowest cost most environmentally friendly energy on the planet. This combined with the development of new manufacturing technology is causing manufacturing to return from off shore. Both could be accelerated if Obama would get his government out of the way by eliminating unnecessary regulations and taxes on both the developers of our huge reserves of natural gas and the investors in the new manufacturing opportunities. This is what really would help the Middle Class!

The reasons why manufacturing is actually returning to the United States after a three decade hiatus are:

• The United States leads the world in digital technology which reduces the speed from product design to manufacture.



• We are learning that when manufacturing is separated from design and engineering, which are evolving with the needs of the market, manufacturing cannot stay apace.



• The natural gas windfall in the US reduces the cost of energy for manufacturing and also produces raw materials for the chemical industry.



• US labor productivity continues to grow, thus becoming an ever smaller part of manufacturing cost



• There is a better relationship between management and hourly workers who play a larger role in product and engineering design



• The cost of labor is rising in China and other low labor cost countries



• The price of oil is rising, thus increasing the cost to ship product from China and other off-shore manufacturers to the US

Much of the information that will be provided in this blog about the return of manufacturing comes from an article in the December, 2012 issue of the Atlantic written by Charles Fishman. The article states that as recently as five years ago the conventional wisdom held that there was little short of a hamburger that could be manufactured competitively in the United States. But there is a major flaw in the idea of off shoring. It has been thought for several decades that engineering and design could be done in the US and the actual assembling of the product could be done anywhere. It turns out that when you separate assembling from engineering and design to chase low labor costs, you lose the evolving development of manufacturing itself. This occurs slowly at first but the gap grows and you never get back. What is dawning on smart American Companies, according to the author, is that when you outsource the making of a product the whole business goes with it.

The article highlights GE’s decision to bring back their GeoSpring water heater from China to Appliance Park.”. Only a few years ago GE was trying to sell Appliance Park, but now, after years of offshore production, General Electric decided to move much of its far-flung appliance manufacturing operations back home. Fishman states that GE hasn’t just changed course, they have “pirouetted”.

A problem became apparent from the start. GE had forgotten how to make the GeoSping heater. So, a new style team was assembled and assigned to develop and manufacture the product. The team consisted of design engineers, manufacturing engineers, line workers and staffs from marketing and sales. Management was deliberately absent. The team realized immediately that the manufacturing design was all wrong. So they went to work to redesign how the product should be made. The final result was that they cut the cost of materials by 25% and cut the work hours to assemble the product from10 hours in China to two at Appliance Park. Consequently, GE could set the retail price 20% bellow the China-made retail price.

The article reports that there are other factors favoring producing a product in the US beyond just costs. Historically the design of a product would last seven years or more. Today, that time has shrunk to about two to three years. It turns out that factories have a learning curve also. It takes a while to settle into a new product or design. This means that a factory is just getting the hang of a new product just as a new product or design is being introduced. What the companies are finding is that this is virtually impossible to manage that problem if the assembly is off shore.

There is another factor that enters into the equation of where to manufacture a product. That is the need to shorten the time from a product’s inception to when it hits the market. Three dimensional printing is a new technology of computerized molding to produce a prototype on the basis of designs on a computer screen. With this technology a prototype can be produced in a matter of minutes, and variations can be tried to eliminate flaws. Consequently, factory management can determine the cost the next day.

Another major difference between the situation today and that of 15-20 years ago is the relationship of management and labor. The atmosphere is different. Management is aware of the problems of offshore production and therefore tries to create a better workplace environment. Importantly also, hourly workers play a larger role in the decision making.

There is an example from the article that epitomizes how the new team approach improves manufacturing, and it is worth mentioning. GE wanted to try to make a dishwasher more competitively. So they assigned a team at Appliance Park to see if they could develop a better lower cost dishwasher. Hourly workers were included in the team. As originally designed, the door had four visible screws. The marketing people wanted the door to have no screws. The workers liked the idea. Four screws takes a lot of assembly time.The engineers came up with a design with one hidden screw and a rod. The whole thing was sleeker, and cheaper. It would not have been possible, however, without the team members all located in the same place.

It turns out that GE is not the only company that is moving the manufacture of many of its products back to America. In-sourcing solves a number of problems. It simplifies transportation; it gives people confidence in the security of their ideas; it is easier to manage costs; and it is easier to get the right product to the right customer.

Last October, my nephew, Barron Smith gave me a chance to visit four machine shops in the Dallas area where he also operates such a facility. During this tour I was able to see first hand the latest cutting and shaping technology for manufacturing parts. This is something everyone should see, because all of the opportunities and problems that American manufacture has to deal with are on display. The new technologies for forming, shaping and cutting a piece of material to meet some specification are just amazing. And these shops are not just working with ordinary iron or steel anymore. The materials include complex and constantly changing alloys and even plastics. The sophisticated use of the computer in managing some of the complex machinery is inspiring, and one gets the feeling that we “ain’t seen nothin’ yet”. As a consequence of this, the workers must be skilled, and more than that, they have to be able to adapt to new methods of working with newer materials such as alloys and plastics as well as the addition of computerization in the operation of the machine itself.

Which leads to a problem that the shop owners have, namely, how to get and keep workers who are capable of doing more and more sophisticated tasks? Each manager in the plants lamented the fact that he cannot see where the new employees will come from considering the state of our K-12 system and the under supported Vo-tech schools. One of the owners has become so discouraged about his that he has set up his own Vo-Tech school right on his plant site with a professional educator to head it up!

In summary, American manufacturing is making a come back, and it could become bigger than ever before. We are witnessing a virtual revolution in the creation of and manufacture of products which will lead to more good jobs in America than ever thought possible only a few years ago We still have innovative persons at all levels in the process as the GE example shows, and such innovation is not exclusively held by the big companies such as GE. I observed the same thing in our machine shops in Dallas. What is new is that the jobs will be more sophisticated than ever before as more and more the workers become an integral part of the designing of the product. This means that these will be well paying jobs for those with the skills, and who are willing to work.

Finally, it would help if the main stream media and our legislators would take the time to catch up with this exciting and vitally important development. For example, if our legislators understood these principles, they could help by removing barriers that thwart the development and expansion of US energy development and manufacturing. Tax and regulatory barriers that make American manufacture less competitive globally should be removed. It would also help if our school system placed more focus on VoTech and less on college where only half of the graduates can find work commensurate with their training. Research that helps expand manufacturing efficiency should be supported and even subsidized where appropriate. Such cooperation between industry and government would do more to expand the middle class than anything else President Obama has in mind. Moreover, with the development of low cost energy and if manufacturing comes back, our economy will start to grow with the attendant rise in revenue which will help ameliorate our debt problem.

PERSPECTIVE: ON ABORTION

Since we are acknowledging the fortieth anniversary of Row V. Wade, it seems appropriate to reflect on   what we have gained, if anything, from this ruling.

First let’s see what has happened to language in our country. Old words and old definitions do not meet today’s politically correct sensibilities. As an example, consider the re-definition of the word “acts of terror”. These heinous acts are planned to destroy other humans. Today, acts of terror are now defined as “man made disasters”. There is no question that an act of terror is a “man made disaster”
Abortion is such a word. We now call it “choice”. Abortion, plain and simple is the deliberate destruction of an incipient human. The aborted fetus was on the way to becoming a human being, and the natural process was cut short by the decision of a human being who “choose” to terminate it. Should these acts be called “man-made disasters”?

Since 1973 when the Supreme Court decided that the Constitution permitted a pregnant woman to decide to have her viable fetus killed by a health provider, over 40 million potential Americans have been killed or about one million per year. For comparison cancer, our worst killer causes about 550,000 deaths per year. And there are about 15,000 murders per year of which about 9,000 are from firearms. Can you imagine the outrage and demand for action if there were one million murders per year related to firearms? The demand for repeal of the Second Amendment would be ear shattering.

These statistics should give us pause. How can abortions be two times the rate of cancer deaths and 100 times the rate of murders in our country with nary a comment by the media, the church or any other so-called responsible group? This is nothing less than an outrage, and it should cause all to scream out loud.

Part of the question about what is abortion stems from the question of when does life begin. Abortion advocates believe that life only begins when the fetus is born and leaves the womb, unless the abortionist fails to terminate the fetus, and it is born still alive, then it is within the right of the abortion provider to kill the now human baby.

Well, as any fool knows, life begins at conception, period. We have always known this. If we did not know it right away, the woman whose menses stopped had a very strong clue. Then when the fetus was large enough to stir around in her womb, the woman knew it and usually asked her husband or boy friend to place his hand on her stomach and she would say, “Did you feel it kick”. Whereupon, he would reply, “Yes, and I wonder if it is a girl or boy!”. Today, there is no guess work. We can tell within days that conception has taken place, and then with sonograms, can watch the progress, and long before the birth date, can tell if it will be a boy or girl.

It may surprise you to learn who does choose abortions. Here are the facts:

• 93% of all abortions are because the child is unwanted or inconvenient

• 6% of abortions relate to physical health problems regarding mother or child

• 1% of all abortions occur because of rape or incest

Of all the information given above, the most important and disgusting is the child is unwanted or inconvenient. This should shock us and frighten us to a point where we should want to do something about it. Choosing to abort a fetus should not be a unilateral decision because there are others who have a stake in this incipient human life; namely, the father, the relatives of the potential child. Society also has a stake because it needs new lives to replace those who are leaving life so that society and our culture can be sustained. It is an interesting and frightening statistic that Western Civilization is not replacing itself. As a result it is predicted that Europe will become Muslim within the current century. That is scary because the technological developments we have come to rely upon and enjoy have been created principally by members of the Western Civilization. If the supply of humans in what we call western culture continues to diminish, the outcome and result can be predicted. The picture is not pretty.

Consider this. If a person tires of a pet and drops it into the street, it is considered “cruelty to animals” for which one can be arrested. Because we are concerned about this horrible act society has formed an organization called the Society for Prevention to the Cruelty of Animals (SPCA). SPCA facilities exist in nearly every neighborhood in America.

If we have no compunction about providing funds for the sheltering of unwanted animals vis a vis the SPCA, what would be so terrible about providing a comparable organization for the handling of these unwanted potential citizens? If the word Orphanage is too repugnant to use in our politically correct environment, surely we can find a euphemistic and politically correct term to define what such a facility might be called. Might I be so bold to suggest the “Society for the Prevention of the Abortion of Unwanted Fetuses (SPAUF)?

PERSPECTIVE: WHY THE NEW ENERGY SUPPY IS IMPORTANT!

This Blog will pick up where the last one left off.



At last the Media has caught on to the idea that the United States is up to its eyeballs with natural gas and oil supplies due to deep well drilling technology that has recently been demonstrated to be viable and environmentally safe. It has also suddenly become known that the cost of compressed natural gas (CNG) is significantly less than gasoline and diesel fuels and that it is being adopted by trucks and buses everywhere. And soon the public will learn that when we abandon the foolish idea of using corn and soy beans for automotive fuels, the price of foods will come down. Once the public becomes better informed, perhaps they will start to lean on their representatives to get off such senseless ideas as windmills, solar panels and using foods to substitute for transportation fuels, and instead get on with the use of our own low cost environmentally friendly natural gas to get our economy moving again. This “windfall” will not only result in low cost energy and lower food prices but it will strengthen the dollar and create a multitude of new high paying jobs. And if that is not enough, getting off foreign oil means that the United States could reap multibillion dollar cost savings by withdrawing its military commitment to the Middle East and let the Russians and the Chinese deal with the radical Muslims and their Arab Spring. What’s not to like?

In addition to methane, the main energy source, natural gas contains other hydrocarbons such as ethane, propane and butane which are attractive feed stocks for chemical plants. Shell Oil and Dow Chemical Company have just recently announced multi-billion dollar plants based on natural gas products. Normally, these chemical companies would obtain their feed stocks and energy sources from oil, and, in all probability, without this new low cost supply, these chemical and polymer producers would locate their new plants overseas. And there is another development which needs be noted. This new low cost energy source coupled with our innovative and rapidly developing digital technology is attracting manufacturing back into the United States. More on that subject will be in a future blog.

Now, you would think that the environmentalists would be wild about natural gas, because it produces about 50% less carbon dioxide than other fossil fuels. It also practically eliminates the production of toxic gases from the combustion of gasoline and diesel fuel. Finally, natural gas does not require a petrochemical refinery. Actually, environmentalists have been trying to kill refineries for years, and for the most part they have been successful. With the exception of two new refineries under construction out west, we haven’t built a new refinery in the United States in 35 years because of expensive environmental regulations and the NIMBY syndrome (Not In My back Yard).

Nevertheless, we can expect the “spoil sport” environmental activists to do everything they can to thwart the development and exploitation of this new drilling technology. However, it will be difficult for them because these new supplies of energy are being procured from privately held land. Drilling on public land, wildlife refuges or off-shore is not needed at this time. Nevertheless, we can expect the Obama Admistration to do everything within its power to regulate natural gas development claiming that fossil fuels are the cause of climate change, citing such examples as Sandy, Katrina and the large number of tornados.

Fortunately for us this energy windfall is being spear headed and financed by the big oil companies; consequently, this exciting development does not require new entrepreneurs who have to learn how to run businesses, raise capital and develop the US and export markets. Most importantly, it does not require the Federal Government to provide capital and subsidies to make it competitive as do wind, solar and bio energy sources.

The biggest advantage of this enormous new source of energy is that it will doubtless cause the GNP of the United States to grow at a huge rate. This, in turn, will produce large increases in Federal revenue, which in all probability, will cover the cost of the Medicar , Social Security and other entitlements that the voters will not permit their representatives to reduce or even touch.

This new source of energy will last more than 100 years, and if we believe that it will create a huge economic boom, then we should stop worrying about the problem with entitlements. Actually that problem will end in about thirty years anyway.

Here is why. The 80 million “boomers” are retiring at the rate of 10,000 per day and are in the final two or three decades of their lives, and the next generation is only half the size of the boomers. Therefore, it is clear that the entitlement problem will take care of itself without the government or anyone else doing anything about it.

What this tells us is that we should stop wasting time fretting about whether the Congress and our current President are hopelessly gridlocked. Instead, we should hope that they remain gridlocked so the private energy entrepreneurs can get the infrastructure in place to provide and transport the new low cost energy to us the consumers as fast as possible so that we can realize the large increase in GNP. All our representatives have to do is get out of the way.

The voters are not stupid; they consume energy and food, and most of them seek work, so we can expect them to support this development even while the Obama Administration tries to convince them that that this opportunity should be regulated so as to promote wind, solar, bio and other so-called clean energy ideas. Consequently, sooner or later they will be screaming for their representatives to get on board with this energy windfall.

Finally, the mantra of the Conservative Party should be this: Waste no time worrying about entitlements, do everything we can to capitalize on this “energy windfall” and speed us on a sensible path that will keep the United States the greatest country on the planet for the next one hundred years.

PERSPECTIVE: WHITHER THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?

One should not be surprised at and at the same time deeply concerned about the outcome of the November 6 re-election of Barack Obama. This President came into office in 2008 talking about spreading the wealth, and now he believes he has a mandate to raise taxes on the wealthy come hell or high water. He has a democratically controlled Senate that will rubber-stamp this idea but a House controlled by the Republicans who are against that idea. The Country is divided, and we elect representatives for the House and Senate who are also divided. Consequently, and shock of shock, they are not working together. Thus we are in for stalemate while we continue to face major problems such as the “fiscal cliff”, a non-job creating sluggish economy, huge and growing entitlement driven debt and a middle east about to explode. This is not the first time that a President has had to work with a divided Congress, but at this critical time leadership from this President will be vital!

The problem is that during the last four years President Obama has demonstrated his inability and/or unwillingness to lead. He proudly let Nancy Pelosi develop the “Affordable Healthcare Legislation” (Obamacare). The nearly one trillion dollar stimulus bill was nothing more than a huge pile of “pork” which nearly everyone agrees had virtually no effect on improving the economic condition. On foreign policy he takes pride in “leading from behind”. We need only observe the fiasco of the Terrorist attack on our Consulate in Libya and the murder of our Ambassador and three other Americans to see the lack of leadership on that issue.

Bob Woodward in his latest book, “The Price of Politics” documented Obama’s rudeness to the Republican leaders from the very first days of his becoming President. This past week we saw it again in both Obama’s embarrassing tax increase proposal, and a few days later we saw it again in the way he dismissed the Republican’s counter proposal. Because of such a high-handed approach, it is no wonder that Republicans not only can’t trust Obama, they can barely stand him.

Despite these perfectly clear deficiencies in his leadership capabilities, especially when contrasted with those demonstrated by Romney, and notwithstanding that Obama may just be following Saul Alinski’s principles for destroying the country, a majority of the voters decided to keep Obama anyway. So, we are stuck with this kind of inadequate and inappropriate leadership.

However, the Country simply can’t afford Four More Years like we have just finished. So what can be done? Perhaps the Congressional Democrats could persuade Obama to hire Colin Powell for some key advisory position in the Administration. Why? Well, Powell has just co-written a book on Leadership. Perhaps he could teach Obama how to lead. Moreover, Powell endorsed Obama thus there may be a buddy to buddy relationship which will help our Country at this dangerous time.

But let’s assume the worst from this President and his clueless entourage. What is in store for the Country? Is it doomed, will it fall apart? Will the takers increase to a point where the makers can’t give any more? Worse, will the makers decide to make it in an other country? In this digital age that is distinctly possible.

The good news is that we have two very important assets which will be vital for not only our survival but for the United States to continue to be the powerhouse we have been for the past two centuries.

These assets are:

• An unbelievable abundance of energy supplies

• The best Universities in the world for creating cutting-edge technology

The energy resources are so enormous that no government will be able to shunt them aside or completely control them regardless of theories that utilization of these fossil materials may cause and/or exacerbate so-called global warming. Specifically, we are talking about the super abundance of natural gas found a mile underground which is already being liberated and additional supplies being discovered a mile or so below that. We are now told that our Country has the largest supply of natural gas and oil on the planet

Compressed natural gas (CNG) is the perfect fuel of our trucks, trains and even automobiles. Already fleets of busses and trucks are being converted to CNG. Not only is it less expensive than diesel fuel and gasoline, it is more environmentally friendly. It produces only half of the so-called greenhouse gases of any fossil fuel, and it produces virtually none of the toxic gases of coal or petroleum. Moreover, it does not require a refinery to convert the oil to fuel. Equally important, it avoids using increasingly scarce food stuffs such as corn and soybeans to make ethanol and bio-diesel.

An ancillary benefit of converting our trucks and cars to CNG is that we can stop importing OPEC controlled oil. This not only will strengthen the dollar, but will permit a complete overhaul of our foreign policy. The United States would no longer need to place expensive military equipment and personnel in Arab territories to protect the supply of oil. We could then let the Chinese and the Russians, who have never supported us, take over that role.

Chemicals and plastics can also be manufactured from natural gas. It is a perfect raw material, and natural gas is perfect for heating the chemical plant boilers, as well. Already Shell Chemical and Dow Chemical have announced multibillion dollar plants based on this low cost supply of natural gas

In addition to the above, the idea of low cost electricity made from natural gas is being eyed by manufacturers who, utilizing the latest digital high tech technology, can now afford to bring manufacturing back to the United States.

As regards our second resource, namely that our universities are the best in the world and at the cutting edge of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, (STEM), the problem is they are not producing enough graduates who major in STEM. Today after spending about

$ 200,000 for a four year college degree only half of the graduates can find employment commensurate with their degree. However, the ones who majored in STEM are having no difficulty finding very remunerative jobs. In fact the demand is so great for STEM graduates in the United States that the starting salary for a chemical engineer needed to design and run the aforementioned Shell and Dow chemical plants is
$ 125,000.

In short, the good news is that the force of this natural gas windfall is so powerful that any attempt by Obama’s Czars to throttle it will fail. Further, we don’t have to reconstruct the K-12 system to solve the stem problem as the Obama administration suggests. We simply have to find a way to encourage the half of college students who are taking courses for which there are no jobs, to take courses for which there are jobs. In other words to major in STEM.

These are the questions that will be considered in future blogs as we examine the broad question of “Whither the United States of America?

PERSPECTIVE: WHY LEADERSIP MATTERS.

Any Committee or Group must have a leader, or else it will not produce what is wanted. The leader of a committee is called the Chairperson. The Committee we are concerned about that lacks leadership is the United States Congress and Senate. The leader of that group should be the President of the United States. The Country is divided, and we elect representatives who match that division. So, we can bitch all we want about the ineffectiveness and stalemate of these two groups, but the only way there can be any progress forward is if a strong leader steps up to lead and knows how to lead. We need only to observe President Obama, and notice that, because he fails to lead, the Country is stalemated.

As President, with a democratically controlled House and Senate, he chose to let Nancy Pelosi develop the “Affordable Healthcare Legislation” (Obamacare) which contains some 2400 pages of stuff that Nancy said had to be passed before we could read and understand it. His nearly one trillion dollar stimulus bill, was nothing more than a huge pile of “pork” which he said he is against. Everyone agrees that it had virtually no effect on improving the economic condition. On foreign policy he takes pride in “leading from behind”. We only need know about the fiasco of the Terrorist attack on our Consulate in Libia and the murder of our Ambassador to see the lack of leadership, and worse, buck passing..

So the Administration is now taking a page out of Bill Clinton’s book, “It depends on what the meaning of we is”. And what does “we” mean? Does it mean the Administration? Does it mean the State Department? The Defence Department? The National Security Council?

It is unthinkable that our Government did not see the latest episode of Terrorist activity coming. There were two prior attacks on our Benghazi facility this past Spring. Moreover, we have a National Security Council that is constantly meeting and supposedly updating the President every day on the status of the “War on Terror”? the problem we have with this President and his Administration is that as far as they are concerned, there are no “Terrorists Attacks”. Remember Fort Hood?

Oops, we know that would be the case: Obama missed the National Security meeting the day after we were told that Terrorists were responsible for the destruction of the Consulate and the murder of our Ambassador because of he had an urgent need to fly to Las Vegas for campaigning. Now, we have been informed that he misses about half of these NSC meetings. Perhaps his missing that meeting explains why Omama, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton our UN Ambassador, Susan Rice and Press Secretary Carey failed to get the message from the NSC and days later kept stating it was not a Terrorist attack but merely a predictable reaction to a nasty American-made anti-Muslim movie.

Not only is this embarrassing, it is an outrage beyond belief, and it is a dereliction of duty! We have been under attack from the Islamic radicals ever since Bin Ladin first declared war on the United States during Clinton’s Administration about 20 years ago. Subsequently, we have witnessed one Terrorist attack on US property after another. It started with the first attack on the World Trade Center then the attacks on two of our Embassies in Africa, then the attack on the Cole, to the 911 destruction of the World Trade Center Buildings, the Pentagon and the diverted Crash in Pennsylvania to the massacre at Camp Hood. In addition there were several thwarted attempts to kill Americans and now the assination of our Ambassador and three other Americans at the Consulate in Benghazi in Libia.

What I have just revealed is what you already knew or surmised. Now, for more evidence of the lack of Obama’s leadership, you can read Bob Woodward’s new book, “The Price of Politics”. Woodward is not a conservative ideologue by any means, but he manages to reveal on page after page that Obama not only doesn’t like to deal one-on-one with members of the other party, he is downright rude to them. Woodward documents that Obama was so rude to the Republican leaders from the very first days of his becoming President, that they not only can’t trust him but can barely stand him.

Moreover, Woodward confirms that Obama and his Administration’s approach to most problems is from a passive position. They wait for things to develop before they even consider acting. We knew this! Recall that during the financial collapse of 2008 John McCain rushed from the campaign trail back to Washington because, as a Senator, he felt obligated to do that. Do you recall where Senator Obama was? That’s right! He remained back on the campaign trail waiting to learn more. Somehow Obama’s followers think this is a very intellectual and “cool”, a sign of his being unflappable. Wrong!! This is the sign of a person who does not know what to do and stalls action on the preface that more and more information is needed. This is a telltale sign of a person who does not know how to lead, is afraid to lead or deliberately wants the system to collapse for some ideological objective. God only know what, but it is totally unacceptable. Worse, in the case of Benghenzi, the dereliction of duty may be impeachable.

It really does not matter just why Obama does not lead. It only matters that he DOES NOT LEAD! At this very challenging time in our Nation’s History we not only need a strong experienced leader, WE MUST HAVE A STRONG EXPERIENCED LEADER

Now let’s look at Romney. He played a major leadership role in hugely successful Bain Capital where he led his business partners to take over failing companies and resurrect them into viable organizations in the face of the extremely competitive worldwide business environment. Then he left that job to help the failing 2002 Olympics, and he led the 2002 Olympics to be one of the most successful of all time, placing a “feather in the USA cap at the same time. Then as Governor of Massachusetts he led the State’s democratically controlled House and Senate to enact laws that set the State on a course to balance their budget, reduce unemployment, improve their public education and pass a healthcare bill that works for the State.

THAT IS A LOT OF LEADING!!

So, what else do you have to know about what the key issue is this election cycle. Obama is not the man we need. He has already demonstrated that he is either incompetent and does not want to lead or that he wants the country to fail so that, “Saul Alinski style” the country can be rebuilt as a socialistic state. Regardless of the “why”, he as already failed us and must be replaced. We simply can’t afford Four More Years

By contrast, there is a man of proven ability to lead, and who has the personality, demeanor, along with the brain power and experience to define the problems and create solutions along with the skill and willingness to persuade persons of differing views to follow.

That man is MITT ROMNEY!!

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