Nesmith's Notes

Entries for the ‘USA politics’ Category

Barack Obama – 44th President of the United States of America

“America, in the face of our common dangers; in this winter of our hardship let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brace once more the icy currents. An endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s chirdren, that when we were tested we refused to let [...]

Plug-in Hybrid Retrofit Plan

Andy Grove has a plan to test the viability of retrofitting US autos into plug-in hybrids fashioned along the lines of GM’s Volt design. He suggest testing this on 1 million cars at a cost of about $10 billion mainly due to the continued high cost for batteries ($10,000 per car). He is also pushing [...]

Obama Represents a New Day in America

All Americans can be proud that the country we love has taken a giant leap forward with the election of Barak Obama.  And African Americans should truly rejoice with his victory.  Not that victory in the civil rights movement is at hand, but that the ultimate glass ceiling has been broken.  Not everyone will agree [...]

Generation-WE

This video is worth a few minutes of your time.

The Generation WE movement is the largest generation in history, they are independant – politically, socially, and philosophically – and are spearheading a period of sweeping change in America and around the world. Check it out.

Gas Tax Holiday Hoax

The McCain – Clinton Gas Tax Holiday is a farce and voters are beginning to realize this. Of course, Obama has been correctly outlining the problems all along. There are numerous problems with this approach even if the money would trickle into the hands of the consumers who most need it and therefore spend it [...]

Is Founder Control in Public Companies a Good Thing?

Another high profile company going public has decided to maintain control while selling a majority of the economic stakes in the company to the public.   This time it is Al Gore as a founder of  Current Media.
I certainly agree, the company’s shareholders have a right to decide the control structure they want to have [...]

Dan Rather Praising Plagerism?

This week’s Sunday news programs were chock full of election experts sharing some interesting comments and many that were less so. My favorite was Dan Rather’s depiction of Hillary Clinton’s closing comments at the Tuesday night Austin debate as the best statements of the campaign. Surprisingly, earlier in the day, Meet the [...]

10 days that unexpectedly changed America

The excellent series on the History Channel, 10 Days that Unexpectedly Changed America, continues to be very educational and quite entertaining. Watching these 10 events, I feel compelled to add and question if perhaps other unexpected events would be in my top 10. Their events are:

Massacre at Mystic
Shays’ Rebellion: America’s First Civil War
Gold [...]

Massachusetts’ Bold Healthcare Initiative

or overstepping the boundaries of government? Which of these best describes the recent “Healthcare for All” bill supported by an overwhelming majority of the Massachusetts Legislature (154 to 2 in the House and 37 to 0 in the Senate) and Govenor Mitt Romney? The plan’s objective is one shared by all concerned [...]

Security of ports, jobs or politics in port management issue?

Lawrence Kudlow calls the concerns over a United Arab Emirates company winning the bid to manage six America ports as nothing other than bigotry. His name for this, Islamaphobia, will not likely be added to our daily lexicon. The actions it describes are simply wrong headed.

Medicaid Needs Agressive Treatment

The McKinsey Quarterly: Intensive care for Medicaid:
“Every US policy maker knows that Medicaid presents vexing budget challenges, but a new analysis suggests that its costs are becoming truly unsustainable. McKinsey estimates that even after economic growth returns to a steady pace, this government health insurance program, which primarily serves the poor, will consume more than [...]

Howard Dean to Lead DNC

Democratic National Committee
Howard Dean takes the helm of the DNC amid much speculation. Here is his message along with a few other opions.
“A message from Chairman Dean
Today your representatives elected new Party leadership. But more importantly they endorsed the idea that our Party must always be led by the people — because your participation [...]

Truth in Political Advertising – or not!

FactCheck.org Social Security Ads: Risk or Protection?
In this the first round of what will surely be a contentious issue for the congress, FactCheck.org weighs in on the accuracy of current ads.
“A pro-Bush TV ad gets the central fact right about Social Security: by the time today’s young workers retire there are projected to be only [...]

Social Security: Some Facts

NCPA – Social Security – Facts About Social Security
Social Security reform has emerged as one of the defining issues of the 2000 election, but a number of myths and half-truths have clouded the dialogue.
Fact #1: The System Is in Trouble. Social Security is structured as a pay-as-you-go system. That means today’s workers pay the benefits [...]

Social Security and Your Finances according to AARP

The Role of Social Security in Your Financial Planning

“Fact 1: Social Security is the guaranteed part of your retirement plan.
There have been lots of questions raised about Social Security lately. And granted, it isn’t perfect. We at AARP know that it was never intended to be the sole solution to financial security in retirement. But [...]