Beyond the Cusp

January 28, 2017

Reasons for NOT Moving the Embassy to Jerusalem

 

This has been the most and greatest coverage we have seen since the Inauguration of President Trump when covering his promises and the possibility that he might falter. Every article has mentioned different choices predicting which promises the President Trump would renege upon. Many claimed he would never build the wall along the Mexican border. Some kind of cheated by claiming that he would merely use a fence or even cameras with computer monitoring for motion detection and alerting the Border Police instead of building a wall along the entire border. Some would claim that the terrain would prevent it being a wall along the entire border but these arguments were disingenuous as the wording of a “wall along the Mexico border” simply meant closing the border through the use of combined deterrents, walls, fences or monitoring through advances of technology in the most difficult terrain or least used crossing locations and simply closing the border using all means necessary and required. Others claimed he would be unable to deport all the illegal immigrants as promised. First off, that was not the promise. He promised to deport illegal immigrants with felony convictions and to work at finding an equitable solution in which deportation may be an integral part of the equation.

 

The one item which made virtually every article’s list was the promise to move the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Almost, well, honestly every article we read claimed that President Trump would not be capable of moving the embassy as the threats, dangers, political pressures or even that Trump would use moving the embassy to force the Israelis to make the next concession of dividing Jerusalem and returning to the 1949 Armistice Lines with very minor land swaps making a final peace deal. What the problem with the claim is that the Congress passage and the signing into law of the Jerusalem Act “recognized Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel, under Israeli sovereignty.” That makes an undivided Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty United States law and thus holds any President to standing either actively for the undivided capital of Israel as being all of Jerusalem or remaining silent, no matter how President Obama attempted to divide Jerusalem as he disregarded numerous laws including the United States Constitution. Even some Israeli media has come up with lists for why President Trump will not, or should not (Haaretz), move the embassy to Jerusalem claiming things so extreme as stated by Haaretz, “Relocating its embassy to Jerusalem would mean the U.S. taking a partisan stance on a central and sensitive issue, a source of controversy between Israel and the Palestinians, and between Israel and the international community.” That is a falsehood unless moving the embassy to western Jerusalem would be taking a position that western Jerusalem would remain part of Israel. Is Haaretz indicating that Israel should leave western Jerusalem and if that is the meaning, then what else should Israel surrender or does Haaretz stand with the most extreme position such as that expressed by Helen Thomas who stated on May 27, 2010, when asked whether she had any comments on Israel? “Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine,” she replied. “Remember, these people are occupied and it’s their land. It’s not Germany, it’s not Poland.” When further asked where they should go, she answered, “They should go home.” When asked where’s home, Thomas replied: “Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”

 

Move American Embassy to Jerusalem

 

The American Embassy could easily be moved to even the most western edge of Jerusalem and be as far as possible from any lands under dispute and still there would be whole hosts of people screaming that the United States is persecuting the Palestinian Arabs and determining to cheat them out of their homeland. This might at first glance appear as a ridiculous position to take as it could be so easily repudiated except that the Palestinian Arab claims include all of Jerusalem. The reality is the United States has already made a statement that is determined to cheat the Palestinian Arabs out of their homeland by leaving their embassy in Tel Aviv as the Arab claim is to all of Israel just as the students chant in campuses across the United States, Europe and beyond, “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free.” The Palestinian Arabs are actually the entire Arab world’s crowbar and will be their implement by which they continue to wage their war to destroy all of Israel. The truth is the existence of a United States Embassy is an affront to the Palestinian Arab claims to their “rightful” country which would be built on the ruins of the Jewish State as anything less would be an aberrance to their stated demands and eventual goals. This is part of why Mahmoud Abbas, and Yasser Arafat before him, refused even offers which granted them with over 90% of Judea and Samaria along with all of Gaza and east Jerusalem as their capital when offered in 1999, 2000 and in 2008.

 

So, why should President Trump move the United States Embassy to Jerusalem according to us here at Beyond the Cusp? Well, we could use our favorite reason when trying to win an argument as kids with our parents when life got between us and a promise to go somewhere fun, “But you promised,” but we know that does not wash when things are on this level. First, it would send a message that there really has been a change in Washington D.C. and that the change will very likely be permanent for all intents and purposes. The world’s train is racing towards oblivion and nobody is manning the breaks. The old steam engine is racing with its speed balls spinning full out threatening to blow off their spinners. Everything about the old globe is screaming, whistles blowing and rivets near popping and the boiler exploding and the Deadman’s switch rig disabled and there is nobody in the cabin. Well, there was nobody in the cabin. This was the picture of the world not long ago and hopefully things will be saved before we hit a sharp curve and it all goes off the tracks. Brexit was step one and President Trump is step two but nobody knows how many steps it will require for sanity to rescue the world. Will the needful steps be taken or will the next cataclysm strike before the world regains sanity. What are the necessary steps that will bring the world back within the bounds, who can tell? The world has been slowly gaining reckless speed slowly slipping out of control and towards untold violence. There are those forces which would welcome the untold violence. They loudly proclaim their love for violence and the death it brings. They claim to worship death and that this allows them power over all who worship life. Their claim is that death conquers life. Those who love life claim that death is the rest one receives after a full, long and hopefully well spent life. These are opposing views which cannot be reconciliated, one must prevail. The good news is that President Trump is aware of the challenge though he has spoken only about it through allegory and indirect references. Moving the United States Embassy would be a strong message when it is announced as a definitive and executable policy decision. Perhaps that is the future for the moving of the United States Embassy, a declaration that the United States and life will declare over death and those who believe it is primacy. Yes, perhaps the moving of the Embassy will be a greater declaration than what the debaters believe it will be. Perhaps there is a grander plan than we are aware, perhaps the plan is greater than men and from beyond our understanding. This may be a greater issue than a mere embassy and the city in which it sits. Jerusalem had been more than a city and perhaps this is more than a simple embassy. Lastly, if the reason not to move the embassy to Jerusalem is because it reportedly will inflame Muslim passions moving them to further animosity and in turn greater acts of violence, then there is no reason not to move the embassy as from all observations of the Middle East, especially Syria, Iraq, Turkey, Libya and both Sudan and South Sudan as well as the levels of terrorism in Europe, more so Western Europe and also in the United States, though there it has been reported as anything but terror, especially Islamic driven terror, the levels could not conceivably be any higher. Violence, thy name is Islam, has become a truism of our times and thus simply move the embassy as there is no possible additional levels other than war, and that will happen whether the embassy is moved or not. If we had our way and the United States had not already purchased the land, then we would call for the embassy not only to be moved to Jerusalem but to the Jewish sector of the Old City as well. After all, did not Trump promise that his Presidency would be a brave and bold rebeginning for America and her relations with her friends? Well then, let’s get it off on the right foot.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

January 22, 2017

The Clocks Are Ticking Bibi

 

We understand that for a brief period you might slowly back away from your pushing the Two State Solution and replace it with a final ultimatum to Mahmoud Abbas, negotiate in good faith or all agreements are now null and void. Set a deadline like, oh, say the first of July, or perhaps June. Then, when Mahmoud Abbas instead makes demands at the United Nations General Assembly claiming that Israel refuses to negotiate honestly, remind him that technically the Oslo Accords had an end by date which was passed long ago and any allowance Israel has made by not deporting him and his merry band of cutthroats has been good faith times ten. Then remind him of the deadline and that this is as far as Israel is willing to extend the moribund Oslo Accords. Remind him that once the Oslo Accords are made defunct, that he no longer has any authority and his Security Force of enforcer thugs will be disarmed and disbanded as Israel will be reclaiming her weapons and enforcing all Israeli laws about firearm ownership. Further, point out that abiding by International Law that once the Oslo Accords are considered abrogated, that there is no Palestinian Authority and the PLO returns to being a terrorist organization and Fatah has no standing as it only existed to serve as the terrorist party which ran the Palestinian Authority as a dictatorship. Remind Abbas that his term of office ended years ago and that Israel will be holding new election across the areas of Judea and Samaria for local offices in every town and city. These elections will be monitored by Israel and Fatah will not be on any ballots because he and his merry band of thieves are going to be back in Tunis or wherever they can find someplace which will accept them. You might want to mention that Syria is the default location for his banishment so he had best find someplace a little less terrifying unless Syria suits his ideas for the future. That is what should happen and what many Israelis are hoping will happen.

 

President Obama is gone and United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2334 is an advisory resolution with no enforcement or even advisory status and the nations who are now committing to boycotts are using UNSC Res 2334 as their cover and would use anything they might ever find, even a call from Mahmoud Abbas or any of his henchmen as reason for boycotting Israel. You will notice their boycotts are selective in that they are only boycotting items which they are able to buy elsewhere and not Israeli technology, medical breakthroughs, agricultural developments, communication devices and all other wonders from Israel and aiming for retail items. Perhaps Israel should start a boycott of the nations who are boycotting Israel by refusing to allow them anything Israeli, except that is not how Israel or the Jewish People work as we try to be a better people by not stooping to the low levels others may take against us. Israel refuses to give up on peace despite everything that has worked to make that overly costly and cheated us of the lands we were promised by the world for over fifty years. We gave peace and the Arab Palestinians every opportunity including the Gaza Strip to show their true colors and their idea of what peace should be. They showed they defined peace as dead Jews, an Israel bombed and rocketed back to the Stone Age and in ruins, a desolate ruin with six-million Jews murdered, preferably in their sleep as that makes them unable to fight back. Whenever they attempted to destroy Israel by force they failed because we fought back, period. Every time Israel made a concession, surrendered control of land to the Arabs or anything else to forge peace we were answered with violence and terrorism. No more as we have had enough and we demand our government give our ultimatum and make peace now or end the farce.

 

When we elected your party we did so because we desired an end to the roundabout of demands followed by terror attacks followed by further demands then terrorism over and over endlessly and we were told that this would end. Then came President Obama and a threat over our heads held by the United States President who had nothing but spite and hate for Israel and religious Jews. He favored Iran controlling the Middle East and Israel a secondary power and soon to be a relic talked of fondly as they always do once the Jews have been defeated. After the Shoah we heard the sorrow and apologies and the claims of “We didn’t know.” The lies and the regrets over the dead Jews when the real sorrow was there were live Jews who were now demanding their nation which had been promised already for twenty years and counting. The British did everything they were able to arm the Arabs who were dedicated to murdering the Jewish State at her birth and who rose up with the Mufti of Jerusalem, the Mufti just returned from spending the war in Berlin and attending the Wannsee Conference where he was considered an advisor and expert on how to address the Jewish Problem. There exist reports which give the Mufti credit with suggesting that the Jews be liquidated completely and requested that when the Nazis conquered the Middle East and allowed him to rule it that they assist him with what would be his Jewish Problem. He definitely organized militias and rear attacks by numerous Arab villages during the war of elimination waged against Israel in 1948. The Mufti of Jerusalem commanded a division called the Arab Brigade which was made up of Arabs who had been living alongside the Jews in the lands of the British Mandate west of the Jordan River. These forces already held most of Jerusalem and much of Judean Hills and Samaria as well as parts of the Galilee and Negev as well as what is today called the Arab Triangle in the southeastern Galilee bordering Judea and were well armed allowing the Arab armies from six nations plus volunteers to gain large swaths of what the world had promised Israel including all of Jerusalem. It took the Israelis most of a year to slowly regain land and open a road to Jerusalem and manage to take the western end of Jerusalem but were unable to take the Old City, Temple Mount and much of the historic Jewish Capital City. When that war was ended we heard again how sorry the world was that they had to allow the Arabs to retain lands which were promised Israel. They then armed the Arabs and by 1967 they were ready to try and extinguish Israel once again. The world was quick to stop that war after one week as it became obvious after Israel surrounded the Egyptian Third Army in the Sinai Peninsula, had taken the Golan Heights and were a threat to Damascus and pushed Jordan from the areas of Judea and Samaria and liberated all of Jerusalem. The world was again sorry that they did not allow Israel to force their enemies to surrender but instead allowed them a noble end to the fighting. Then they regretted but started demanding Israel return land, just land and later the land and now all the land. The world is sorry so they demand to set up a rematch this time with Hamas and Hezballah along with Iran and who knows who else. Bibi, the world is always sorry and we always accept their apology. Let us give them a reason to be sorry again except this time because we asserted to take that which is ours.

 

Mufti of Jerusalem During Nazi World War II Where He Met the Highest Officers And Attended the Wannsee Conference

Mufti of Jerusalem During Nazi World War II
Where He Met the Highest Officers
And Attended the Wannsee Conference

 

There is no more threat coming from out of Washington D.C. and we have a friend in the White House. We need act because any friend in the White House will face pressures from the enemies of Israel and her Jews in the American government. They exist in the State Department through and through and they are at the United Nations and a swarm of hundreds of antagonistic NGO’s plus enemies in the Congress and who knows where else. All of these will begin pestering President Donald Trump making his life difficult and being such a bother that eventually he will simply grant them a morsel just for a moment’s peace. That will be a brief respite before the spite returns and demands another morsel. We must act before he is forced to grant that first morsel because once that has happened, we will have lost our golden opportunity. Opportunities for Israel and for Jews are a rare and seldom held jewel. Often when these rare jewels do arrive we find that many amongst us become timid and worry that perhaps we need consider the ramifications of acting too fast. They demand we stop and debate the best course. They want a plan laid out with every step planned and the i’s dotted and the t’s crossed before even taking that first step. Our enemies do not plan; they simply attack and attack never giving a moments rest to those who try to assist us. They cannot help us more than we help ourselves. When we falter, they falter as they are not going to stand someplace we refuse to stand ourselves. We must stand forth now and make our position known and strongly stated. We must make the alternative to Abbas negotiating honestly and immediately with our relegating the Oslo accords to the trash bin of history where it should have been tossed years ago. Time ran out on Oslo long ago during the last century and Oslo II has also passed its use by date and belongs next to Oslo in that trash bin of history. The lands of Judea and Samaria belong to Israel by International Law and we all know this. Time has come to annex them and unite them with the rest of Israel. The first thing after that will be to extend Israeli law to all of Judea and Samaria and allow for the sale of land by its owner to whomever they please for whatever price they are able to get without any threat of death from their government. We must bring the rule of law equally to the Arabs who have been deprived their true freedom to grow and gain wealth. Within the first six months there should be elections in every town, city, community and hamlet and the disbanding of the Palestinian authority. Mahmoud Abbas and the rest of the officers and Security Forces need be fully vetted and if any link to terrorism is found, then they need to be deported. There is an alternative and that is to hold an open and free election in Judea and Samaria and allow the Arabs to choose leadership. All the candidates must be vetted by Israel and be free from any terrorist ties. Regular Israeli laws must be extended to all of Judea and Samaria should Abbas refuse again to negotiate in good faith. Breaking off negotiations or demanding unacceptable conditions will not be tolerated and there should be a deadline for reaching an agreement or Israel annexes everything. No more the Arabs demand, break negotiations and then pick up demanding additional concessions before breaking off negotiations again and repeating this in efforts to gain everything without giving in on anything. This has to end now.

 

The end must come within this first six months as to expect President Trump to tolerate endless fake negotiations is ridiculous. Making the Israelis put up with terrorists governing Judea and Samaria teaching hatreds raising generation after generation of new terrorists is unacceptable. All of this ridiculous allowing endless terrorism with wave after wave must not be tolerated any further. The time has come and the opportunity with it for Israel to demand an end. We, the Israeli people, your people, we have endured intifadas, rocket attacks in the thousands, terrorists tunneling under our towns and coming up near our schools and kindergartens threatening our children. No more terror and safety for our children and ourselves. We demand life and our government should provide us with everything for the safety of our towns, cities, kibbutzim and every last farmhouse. No more terror, no more rockets, no more intifadas and no more incitement which will grant us life because our enemies are correct, we choose life and we value life. The Arabs likely also would choose life providing their lives were made worth living. Under the terrorist government they suffer, their lives are made worthless and their opportunities are stolen before they can be realized. Israel must change that for them because doing this and giving them freedom and opportunity will change their views and many will choose life for themselves and their children. We must choose life and give the Arabs the opportunity to choose life and make life worth choosing. The real thing that is debated and negotiated is and always has been life, our lives and the chance for the Arabs to live free as well. Now is the time that we can make this be a real opportunity for the Arabs and giving them the opportunity to thrive and be really alive, will make a real difference and that opportunity cannot be squandered. Too many times we have squandered real opportunities and we the Israelis demand this one not be lost. If you are unable to commit to progress and life for all within our lands then please resign and hold an election so we can find somebody willing to act and do that which is required to make good on this opportunity we have been presented. We want to choose life and freedom without the fear of terror which had plagued us since Oslo and shortly before committed to push us to the false Oslo promise which was actually a promise of a slow death. We choose life, end this tracking of death and let us choose life.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

January 19, 2017

One Single Change Would Wipe Out 90% Congressional Corruption

 

If you spend any time on social media you can only come to one conclusion, graft is everywhere except with the less that powerful. The wealthy get away with everything up to and even including murder, though murder is the toughest one to escape. Congress has far too many members who spend three terms, or even two, and if one is astute, one term and walk away as multimillionaires. Many people ask as to how this can be. Many understand and know why this can be and often is. Senators and Representatives are covered by laws which exempt them from insider trading. So if there is a defense bill coming to a vote and the members of Congress know that in six weeks it will pass, it will easily give company XYZ a multi-billion dollar contract which is hundreds of times more than their budget for the previous five years combined. XYZ stock is selling at $1.23 a share six weeks out, so many, but not all as they take turns according to seniority, buy a thousand shares. The bill passes and Wall Street lights up and within two days that stock now sells for $327.77 a share. The Congress members sell their stock at this point making over $325,000.00 for a six week and two day investment in a stock because they cannot be charged with insider trading. This simple trick goes for much more than defense legislation and at every level of government. In the little township, county, city or borough where you live they repair roads, bridges and build parking garages and hire companies to manage all kinds of government projects. Going into such contracts these are often small family businesses with under twenty-five employees and just initially making stock options. That places their stock initially on the volatile IPO (Initial Public Offering) market which is usually the home for high risk, high reward investors and not for the faint of heart. But when you know that a small operation is about to receive a multi-million dollar, multi-year contract that market becomes far less risky and investing becomes a sure bet. This is the sleight of hand, crooked investing which can be found throughout government at all levels. Often those who would prosecute such criminal acts are also clued in on investments when the opportunity is great enough to allow a broad group to make huge benefits without actually raising too much attention. This is why you find so much money going into governmental elections and influencing because the returns are far beyond the pittance invested. Giving a number of city electors a hundred thousand dollars into their election funding and then after they defeat their opponent who received one fifth the amount they will receive multi-million dollar contracts and the city electors investing wisely become millionaires within a few years and move to Tahiti if they are smart, or buy their own newly charted island and refuse extradition to the United States.

 

This is nothing new as it has been how the Senators in Rome maintained their wealth and how the Caesars ruled over these Senators distributing government monies to those who supported them and not the others. The first Caesar, Julius Caesar made a single mistake, he kept the money with the people and refused to feed the graft machine which was the Senate and the commanders of the legions. This resulted in his big day on the Senate steps where he was made into a pincushion using tens of knives as the pins with the final pin, some claim the fifty-first knife, plunged into Caesar’s back by Brutus, “Et tu Brutus?” Wars were fought throughout antiquity to steal the wealth and enrich the King and their closest advisors and generals who commanded the troops protecting the King and winning their wars. Eventually rulers figured out they could simply tax their subjects and by taking a small to modest amount from each subject reap great wealth. Some rulers made the fatal mistake of figuring that if a modest amount granted great wealth, then doubling the tax would double their wealth. That failed as once you cross a critical point draining from the economy the economy becomes unstable and the gravy train dries up and the people revolt. So many greedy kings found their people to be revolting right before they met the guillotine, the sword or other form of execution, some far less noble at the hands of the rabble. Governmental systems have changed, governing has not. Governing is still how to provide the people with sufficient services and comfort while stealing as much as the market will bear enriching the governing. Can this poisoning of government be rooted out and extinguished? Probably not for as Campaign Finance Reform should have taught the people of the United States is that no matter how you rig the game and what you do to take the money from the hands and supporting structures of the elected public servants, they will simply invent some way around the laws, appear not to actually control what they are forbidden, have an indirect but close knot control of these funds and will make away with the wealth in the end. What is more diabolical and evil are those high government employees who are just below the appointed position who are civil servants, thus presumably untouchable by those in power, gaining wealth through careful investing and manipulation of portfolios to take advantage of information which comes across their desks as part of enacting the particulars of legislations. This has gotten far more prevalent as the legislation leaves the entirety of the building and enacting the structures to fulfill the demands of vague legislations thus allowing much of the distribution of contracts and such to these civil servants. There is little chance that these civil servants are all so clean as to not make investments or find other means of enriching themselves. There are far too many very wealthy government employees whose salaries are less than twenty-five thousand dollars a year, how did they become wealthy? Little problem in figuring that out, is there.

 

Shine a Light on Corruption

Shine a Light on Corruption

 

Money is the grease which oils the wheels of government. That remains true to this day and will likely remain true far into the future. The opportunities to become wealthy from being in the right place to hear the next outlay of millions of dollars by government cannot be eliminated until the government is trusted to machines, and then the question will be who monitors and runs the machines. All we can do is alter where the weakest links are placed and thus who gains from inside information. The history of mankind has in part been the history of seeking perfect governance and the failure at virtually every juncture. There was once a governance which was as close to that perfection people seek but is unwieldy as the people must have the faith to trust their safety and protection from other nations and their invasions or other entreaties to an entity they cannot know and claim daily their inability to understand their ruling entity trusting the messengers who claim to be the sole recipients of that wisdom. This was the ruling by Hashem over the initial Israelite Tribes through the prophets and judges. There was not government largess to benefit from its wealth and how it was distributed as all was in the hands of Hashem and there were no government programs. Roads were made by people traveling between locations using the same route which eventually packs the ground making a clear and obvious path, not what you would desire to drive your brand new Lexus across but perfectly fine for your donkey. Even the advances far, far back around 1100 BCE forced the Israelites to demand to have a King like the neighboring nations to lead their army and protect them from the threats emerging around them and Torah records that Hashem told the Judges and Prophets that should the Israelites demand some form of governance to provide them security, then they should be permitted such governance. This resulted in their taking a king asking the leading prophet to anoint their king leading to King Saul. Saul was not the worst of kings or the best, but his reign led directly through some odd circumstance to King David and then King Solomon which was the shining period where the tribes of Israel were united into a singular nation which conquered lands up to the Euphrates River (see maps below showing Twelve Tribes, King David and Solomon conquest and the promised lands for Israel according to treaties from World War I). Following Kings were less successful with the eventual downfall which coincided with a king who was an idolater and placed idols inside Solomon’s Temple, a low point for the Tribes of Israel. Over the next centuries the Israelites managed to throw off tyrants or be granted autonomy under the sovereignty of a greater power. The Israelites were even permitted to build the Second Temple which included Herod building what is today the Western Wall, built over six hundred years before the founding of Islam and about a century before the birth of Jesus. Herod made himself great amounts of wealth, sufficient to build himself a mountain with a castle and burial crypt in the Northern Negev and live a lavish life of opulence simply by giving the people what they demanded, the Temple Complex, and collect taxes in order to provide the people their desires while fulfilling his own. This has been the formula of effective governance for centuries both before and since, especially since. Many of the iconic public works projects, if investigated and audited meticulously would reveal that many within the government and closely tied to people in the governance and especially with the planning of public works gained great wealth. Be the works be a huge clock in the middle of London, a great dock providing thousands of new jobs in Amsterdam or almost any public work one could mention.

 

Left side map depicts the division of the Promised Land amongst the tribes and right side map compares the modern promised land from the Jordan west to the Mediterranean Sea compared to the maximum of area during King David’s and King Solomon’s reigns.

 

So, how can the vast majority of this corruption, this theft of the public treasure be prevented? The quickest would be to subject politicians and public servants (government workers) to the same laws as the public and demand an accounting of their incomes and investments as well as careful auditing of all contracts. Make all government bids by law be the final price charged with no cost overruns, no additional surprises, and no adjustments or new demands during production that allow for fudging numbers and hiding payouts. Adding that whatever the estimated date of delivery be set such that any time overrun resulting in a percentage of the initial payments budgeted being returned to government as a means of compensating the public for these delays. This would force defense contractors to make realistic and exacting bids instead of making a lowball bid knowing they can increase the cost through delays and cost overrun demands after the initial bid is accepted. The F-35 JSF is a prime example with it coming to delivery a good part of a decade late with cost overruns and technical problems resulting in the price of each fighter costing a good deal closer to double the expected and quoted price. Had these costs been included in the initial bid it is quite possible that the bid might have gone to a competitor. The current development and bidding system used by government contractors, especially in the defense industry, is to guess at what it might cost and to make a bid at three-quarters of that estimate completely confident that the remainder and more sufficient to make the profit desired as well as cover any difficulties along the way. This is a legalized form for guaranteeing theft. If, on the other hand, contractors were made to provide what they promised for the price they bid, and not a plug nickel over, then the bids would be far more realistic and shades higher to cover the expected of the unexpected, or should we simply call it the unplanned snags and other complications. This would allow the government and the voting public, should they be interested, to understand, and know ahead of time, exactly what projects will cost. Currently the public knows that the quoted bids are a ruse and perhaps if they were guaranteed these bids would be the exact delivery price the public might take a real interest. As things are, why bother with the bidding when one really need wait as long as a decade to find out the actual delivery price because there is little or no actual oversight.

 

Government needs to become a business, not a joke, a poke in the dark where truth is a rare commodity and concealed misappropriation the rule of thumb. If a butcher ran his store as governments are run his scale would be off by 10% and he would often have his thumb on the scale as well. Nothing would be as it appears and the rule of buyer be wary would be most necessary. Governments, when designed in democratic based nations, are presumed to be open and to be overseen by the people who by being informed can make solid and reasoned votes for their representatives. Oh, if only this were true. The reality is we elect our candidates or parties, pending on whether we have a representative democracy or a parliamentary system, according to elaborate shows designed to thrill and titillate the public with elaborate deceptions designed to sell the product making it appear more responsible than the governance’s results. The entire production is very Hollywood and just as much a fantasy. This all results in a governance just as deceptive as are the campaigns and the people depicted therein. There is an easy way which we can attest from our experience in running a campaign for the United States House of Representatives where we spent at most $10,000 and received more voted per dollar than either of our high priced opponents despite not quite garnering 3% of the vote (still the record for third party candidates where we ran). Now we feel it is important to point out that this was a campaign for a job which pays $174,000 per year (current salary) for two years for a total of $348,000 total before having to run again. Our two opponents each spent very close to the same amount on their campaigns which was estimated to have been that one spent $1,200,000 and the other spent $2,200,000. These figures for our opponents do not include PAC and Party funds and advertising. Please explain how that explains spending for a job paying $348,000 which only one of us had even a dream of showing a profit unless something else was going on. And Americans complain they cannot figure out what is wrong with their governance. Of course this is not something peculiar to the United States but exists in every government across the world. Democratic nations probably suffer the least from such deception as they do kind of have to answer to the people and when the people get upset, that distress trumps all else. In dictatorial regimes the difference is far more marked as the ruling elite get the best of what is available, that is when there is a best of available to be had. In those places suffering the worst governances imaginable, such as North Korea and Venezuela, eating and having even the necessities can be considered an extravagance. Until we return to Hashem ruling the people or machines keeping humans as their pets, there will be those people using the government for self-enrichment. Always has been and always will be, or so it appears.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Next Page »

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.