The issues of government subsidies is a very large one, but I’d primarily like to focus on the effect the government can have on our higher institutions of learning. In the first Presidential debate Obama stated that he wanted to make higher education more affordable. That begs a couple questions.

1) Is college affordable?

In the last post Trent said life was tough paying for three kids to go to college. Obama says college costs too much. So is college a bad deal? Even at current prices (which are already higher because of the government, but more on that in a minute) college is actually a good deal. Even if you finish college with a boat load of student loans, the extra money you will make as a result of that loan far out way having to pay it back.

When Obama says college is too expensive, what he’s really doing is telling “the poor” that he’d be glad to give them some free monies.

2) What effect does government aid have on tuition?

A basic understanding of economics makes it clear that throwing federal money into higher education makes the price go up. It’s simple supply and demand. The more free tuition there is, the more people want to go, and that demand makes the price go up. If you don’t believe me, believe the CATO Institute.

There are other examples of government subsidies, but I figure we can talk about higher education specifically. Obama brought it up, and like Andrew pointed out, there was no explanation of how he would pay for it. But assuming what I’ve pointed out in the above, even if Obama tries to make college more affordable by throwing money at it, that will only drive the price even higher.

Why not let people pay for it themselves? Oh right, because grossly misusing people’s tax dollars is the socialist way.

First Presidential debate was tonight. Overall there was nothing too out of the ordinary, but it was made extremely clear what Obama’s strategy is.

1) Class Warfare

I’m tired of hearing Obama champion the middle class. He mentioned how teachers are struggling to pay the bills at night. What? My family has TWO teachers, and we’re doing just fine. I don’t want a President who tries to pit the “middle class” against the “rich.”

His tax cuts for 95% of Americans? How do you get a tax cut when when you don’t pay any income taxes to begin with? Oh wait, that’s called redistribution of wealth, aka socialism. But it’s cool to run on a platform of hating the rich and hoping there are enough jealous voters that will support you.

On 20/20 they showed a clip of Obama’s time as a community organizer. It was a bad part of town that went south after a steel plant or something closed. He got a bunch of women together though to go make some demands from their city leaders! The demand? That the government remove the asbestos from their government housing. Haha. Go government!

2) Besides trying to convince people that rich folk are evil, his only other tactic is to convince people that McCain is the same as Bush. He can’t go more than two sentences without trying to equate the two men. I understand doing it a couple times as good strategy, but after months and months it’s just become silly. We get it Obama, you don’t like Bush, you know a lot of other people don’t like Bush, but McCain is actually a different person.

Overall I think McCain came across as more knowledegable, and he should in this debate. This is McCain’s bread and butter. Sometimes I wish McCain would get a little more philosophical and talk about the role of government and that it’s not the government’s job to take care of people, but I’m not sure he could do that. Are there so many people now who expect the government to take care of them that making any suggestion to the contrary is political suicide?

We’ve had discussions about abortion in the past. I’ve heard fellow Christians say that the government shouldn’t stop people from aborting their babies. I challenge any of you who are supporting Barack Obama to read the following article, and then explain to me how your doing so can possibly coexist with your Christian faith. I’ve heard Trent try and defend abortion laws, and I’ve heard Mike say he doesn’t think Christians have to be Republicans, and the same goes for any other Christians supporting Obama or pro-abortion laws.

Read This Now

…and then tell me with a straight face how someone with such views has earned your support.

John McCain made a super smart decision on his running mate. Her name is Sarah Palin. I think she has some major upside over a lot of the other old men that were in the running. I think the best thing this does is make Obama look old and stale for choosing Biden, and I guarantee some disaffected Hillary supporters will jump to McCain now. Awesome choice.

I promise to bury this post with pictures of the baby right away, but I couldn’t pass this one up. Obama refuses to do townhall style debates with McCain. The best part of this whole exchange, which Medved pointed out on Friday, is that the heckler makes wild accusations, but Obama doesn’t even correct him. Instead he basically goes along with the question and talks about himself. My favorite is what Obama says about Sean Bell. He put out a statement saying “it was a problem.” Haha. If you’re impatient, skip ahead to around 2:30.

And people think Bush is a bad speaker? The guy can’t put together a coherent sentence without a teleprompter.

One of my favorite radio commentators is Larry Elder. As a black conservative he is able to share views that I can’t, and speak with an authority on Black America that I can’t. If you’re still deciding who you want to support, listen to the values Larry Elder talks about. When he talks about things like personal responsibility, that is what makes me a conservative. When he mentions Barack Obama’s plan to fix everything via government programs, that is why I am not a liberal.

Nothing too profound to say today, just a few random things I wanted to mention.

While I wait for book edits I’m busy formatting it for printing. There are two major print on demand book publishers, and I’m trying to decide which one to use. One is called Lulu. Something neat they offer is that you can get a real ISBN number for your book and have it available for distribution. It becomes available on online bookstores like Amazon, and brick and mortar stores can order. They won’t automatically, but it can be special ordered, and some people have had success convincing a brick and mortar to order some of their books to sell. The other major printer is called CreateSpace which is owned by Amazon. When you publish here your book is basically only available via Amazon. The other big difference is cost. From the way things look right now, it would basically cost about $20 after shipping from Lulu, but only $10 at Amazon (and it’s eligible for super saver shipping). I’m hoping you’ll all want to buy and read my book no matter what, but any opinions on price? Is a $20 paperback just way too expensive? (In terms of quality they’re somewhere in between the paperbacks you see at the market for cheap, and a good hardcover.)

I’d like to make another recommendation that you should all go listen to Anarbor. They’re so awesome. I still listen to their album over and over on repeat, and for only $6 it’s a total steal.

Nothing too political on my mind, but one thing I’ve observed. If a commercial has two people of different ethnic backgrounds, and one of them is either getting made fun of or doing something stupid, it tends to follow a pattern: the white person is always the loser. Now this isn’t scientific or absolute, but I can think of two examples. Right now there is an AT&T commercial with a guy sitting in front of a window and he thinks he’s watching an HDTV, and he’s a total idiot. His friend telling him what he’s doing is a very with it and together Asian guy. I can’t picture them showing the same commercial with the roles switched. A second example are the Washinton Mutual commercials that featured the black spokesperson and the old white stuffy bankers. The black guy was intelligent and well spoken, and the bankers were the butt of the joke.

I can’t even picture them making a commercial where an ethnic minority is the butt of the joke and a white person is the intelligent one. Same goes for gender. Usually it’s the husband in a commercial that does something stupid and it’s the wife that has to correct him and be the voice of reason. Any other examples you can think of?

To be clear, I don’t particularly care. I try to watch as few commercials as possible, but I think this is an interesting commentary on race and gender in our society. Maybe this is something Obama will address?

As strange as it may sound, during Obama’s multi-country tour of the Middle East I’ve heard several journalists now talk about how he isn’t giving interviews. The entire trip is basically turning into an opportunity for him to get pictures taken in the Middle East. Foreign journalists are being snubbed completely. The German writer Christoph von Marschall remarks:

Surely a man who has said he would talk with U.S. adversaries such as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can spend a few moments with journalists from friendlier countries.

Andrea Mitchell even says she doesn’t know what the heck is going on during the tour, because it’s all a PR stunt. Watch the video here. In fact, when I saw video of Barack shooting hoops in front of the troops, I couldn’t help but notice almost the entire crowd was black.

I think it’s funny that the latenight news runs clips like the above and does zero critical analysis. Clearly the people there wanted to be there, but it came across in the news that all of the military was excited for him to be there. Why can’t the news say “a majority of the attendees were black supporters”? Maybe he’s not giving interviews because they don’t have any teleprompters in the Middle East.

And to really hit you upside the head, CNN is posing the question Could an Obama Presidency Hurt Black Americans? Read the following:

Yet there are a few political commentators who warn African-Americans that an Obama victory could be twisted to suppress the push for racial equality.

So let me get this straight. If Obama became President, it would be bad because then blacks would think they are no longer held down by the white man? Obama can be President, just like Oprah, Tiger Woods, Larry Elder, and 50 Cent are all successful black people. How stupid do you have to be to realize the door is wide open for people of all colors? Even when those doors are thrown wide open with throngs of people passing through them, some people have the gall to say an Obama Presidency would convince people that Blacks have come all the way? No crap, because they have. If you can acheive the Presidency, WTF else do you want your ethnic group to achieve?