Why I'm Voting For John McCain

First of all, I want to start off this post with the top three reasons why I'm not voting for Obama (the deal breakers) and then I'll explain why I'm voting for John McCain.

Obama deal breaker number one: his support for partial-birth abortion.

Obama's support of partial birth abortion and killing the babies who survive botched abortions. When Obama was a state senator in Illinois, the state tried to ban this hideous procedure, but guess who vocally opposed the ban? Yes, it was Barack Obama.
What made me so upset about this issue was reading the descriptions (which are very graphic) of the abortions in the supreme court case DON STENBERG, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF NEBRASKA, et al., PETITIONERS v.LEROY CARHART. The descriptions are enough to make you sick. These procedures are sick, twisted and evil. There is nothing "hopeful" about infanticide - and there certainly is nothing "hopeful" about a candidate who supports and works to protect this wicked practice. This is deal breaker number one! How can liberals even think to explain their support for something like this?!! It is absolutely evil.

Obama deal breaker number two: his friends.

I don't care what every hollywood liberal and CNN pundit says, the old adage remains true: you can tell a lot about a man by who his friends are. Obama was close associates with terrorist Bill Ayers; radical, anti-American preacher Jeremiah Wright; criminal Tony Rezko, he was a member of the Illinois socialist party (do we remember socialism, that pernicious precursor to communism?); he praised highly the corrupt former Detriot mayor Kilwame Kilpatrick who now is spending time in jail, and the list goes on and on. Am I wierd because I question Obama's judgment because he associated with these wackos? I must be wierd, because half the country seems to look the other way when this stuff stares them in the face.

Obama deal breaker number three: his total lack of experience.

He has NO EXPERIENCE doing anything significant in his life. Yeah he went to Harvard, and I give him credit for it, but what has he done with his Harvard education? Became a community organizer? Sounds like a great way to describe "self-employed." But wait, he did become a state senator! Big deal, seems like every other person I meet has an uncle, brother, sister or aunt who's been a state senator. But wait, he was a U.S. senator! Great, finally something significant. So what did he do as a U.S. senator? Hmmm.... Still waiting to hear about that one. Evidently all he did was vote in the most liberal, partisan manner in the entire senate.

These are just the top three. I could go on and on (gun control, gay rights, socialist economic policy, tax hikes, socialized medicine, weak foreign policy, vote down military funding which Joe Biden himself said would only lead to more American deaths, etc. etc.) but I want to get to why I'm voting for John McCain.

Why I'm voting for John McCain reason one: he supports traditional family values.

John McCain supports traditional family values. Take a look at this video:


Contrast that with Obama's answer of "Well, uh, whether you're talking about it from a theological or a biological perspective (or whatever he said, I don't remember the exact quote but this is what he said in substance)...uh, that's above my pay grade." Above his pay grade, give me a break! What a bunch of garbage!

Why I'm voting for John McCain reason number two: his deep foreign policy experience.

John McCain understands foreign policy better than anyone. He is an American hero with his experience in Vietnam and he knows what it's like to be soldier. He knows what it means to be "commander in chief." I want a commander in chief! Not a "community organizer" in chief!

Why I'm voting for John McCain reason number three: his track record of change.

He has a solid track record of change, instead of just yammering about it all the time. He's already crossed party lines, he's already passed tough, bi-partisan legislation, he's already made a stand against earmarks, he's already accomplished the things Obama claims he "can" accomplish. I don't know about you, but I view walking higher than talking. But then again, I'm weird that way. Evidently nearly half the country views talk more than walk. To me, Obama needs a lot less talking and a lot more walking.

I could go on and on (tax policy, energy exploration and reform, health care reform, etc.) about why I'm voting for John McCain, but these are the top three.

This coming election, I hope we all decide what our own deal breakers are. Some things are just too important to sweep under the rug.

If Larry and Sergey Asked for A Loan...

I like this article. Thomas Friedman seems to have it right.

"Bottom line: We must not overshoot in regulating the markets just because they overshot in their risk-taking. That’s what markets do. We need to fix capitalism, not install socialism. Because, ultimately, we can’t bail our way out of this crisis. We can only grow our way out — with more innovation and entrepreneurship, which create new businesses and better jobs.

So let’s keep our eyes on the prize. Save the system, install smart regulations and get the government out of the banking business as soon as possible so that the surviving banks can freely and unabashedly get back into their business: risk-taking without recklessness."

Read the full article here.

The Things I Like About Obama

Well, the election is all but secured for Obama. I don't think McCain has a chance in heck to win this election. He's made far too many political mistakes while Obama has made far too many correct moves. If Obama loses this election, it will be his own fault, I don't think McCain alone can stop him.

Having said that, I want to prepare for an Obama presidency. Though I disagree fundamentally with many of his policy stances, and while I still hold reason to question his judgment with regards to the people he's associated himself with, there are some things I like about him - and they are things that in my mind are of substantial importance to a president.

First: he's a powerful communicator. Obama has a way with words that is unmatched in recent political history. He is a fresh departure from the disjointed bumblings of our current president. And I think that a president cannot be great unless he is first a great communicator. Effective leadership cannot happen without effective communication. While great communication skills certainly do not also automatically beget great leadership skills, great leadership (whether for good or ill) does entail great communications skills.

Examples of this are many and diverse. With the Gettysburg Address President Lincoln gave one of the greatest speeches in all of recorded history and its effect on our country and the world is still being felt. President Washington led with integrity and honor and inspired his legion of followers to do the same by his words and his deeds. President Kennedy, FDR, Ronald Reagan, and yes even to an extent Bill Clinton all had a way with words that not only solidified the nations allegiance to their leadership, but also helped them solve some of the most challenging national and global problems. George W. Bush has not had that ability and as a result has suffered dearly in terms of political clout and influence.

A strong command of words is an essential asset to any president, and it is his greatest weapon to use in solving challenging problems. Obama has that critically important command of language.

Second: He's smart. I like that Obama has a law degree from Harvard University. That tells you something of his ability to think critically and analyze problems on an intellectual level. I like that. I don't want a president who doesn't read the newspaper and doesn't understand the basics of critical thinking and analysis. And I know that so many conservatives will cry out that because of his Harvard background he must be an "elitist intellectual," well I've got news for every conservative who thinks that: Mitt Romney is the exact same way with a similar Harvard background. Yet conservatives would never label him an elitist with the same vim and vigour as they do Obama.

Third: He's an optimist. As I read his book "The Audacity of Hope" the thing that stood out to me the most was an impressive hope for the future and an outlook that saw the possibilities amid the problems. As cheesy as it may seem to some who'd rather wallow in their own depressing cynicism, hope for the future helps to illuminate a bright path through a dark challenge.

There you have it. Despite this list of things I like about Obama, I must re-emphasize that the things I dislike about Obama far outweigh my likes. He's lax on abortion, gay marriage and tax hikes. He's got less management experience than I can possibly be comfortable with. He's "palled around" with characters who put a new definition on the word shady. He's a smoker, something that screams poor judgment (sorry to any smokers out there, but I mean, c'mon, smoking is dumb, most smokers are the first to admit that). In short, he's an enigma - while he has certain characteristics that are appealing, he has a host of liabilities that I cannot ignore. That's why I'm still planning to vote for McCain.

But I will say this also, given Obama's strengths I do see potential for him to be a good president. But I don't think it's worth risking his unknown side.

I'm Starting To Think "Opportunity"

Amid the fear and restlessness in the markets these days lies a golden gem of opportunity - capitalizing on the impending upswing.

Let me give you my reasons why there is an emerging opportunity amid the pandemonium on Wall Street, and why we should have our investment radars on full alert in the next few months.

The drops in the market are increasingly based on fear rather than on investment fundamentals. There is no question we had a huge bubble in the previous several years. The credit available in recent years for almost anyone to get a mortgage (and the subsequent securitization of those mortgages on Wall Street) was totally unsustainable in the long term. We are now feeling the fat and excess being wrung out with considerable force and immediacy. That is the fundamentals behind the recent drop in the stock market, and it was a necessary correction in our economy. But now that the Dow has slid on a week-long fall back into the 8,000's, we are starting to see fear, rather than fundamentals, drive the prices lower thus allowing bargains to emerge in the near future. But before we get too excited and start buying, we need to realize that the fear factor is really just starting, and if it gains momentum, we could see the Dow tumble even further, despite glaring fundamentals showing that prices have negatively overshot values of strong companies.

If we analyze the possibilities for the current bottoming out of the market against historical precendence, we could face a Dow that dips to below 6,000 before it starts on a strong upswing. These numbers are based off the research of Robert Shiller, a Yale University professor of finance who uses an adaptation of the Graham P/E (share price to company earnings ratio). According to the Wall Street Journal, the formula divides the price of major U.S. stocks by their net earnings averaged over the past 10 years, adjusted for inflation. Currently, the Graham-Shiller measurement has the S&P 500 at 15 times earnings, the lowest level since 1989, but still not far off from the average (which includes yearly data from 1881 to now) of 16.3. The times when the measure went way low was during World War II, 1977, and 1984, years which had the measurement at 10 or below. If the Graham-Shiller measurement for this market dropped to below 10, the Dow would be below 6,000 - a possibility given that the measure did go below 10 in the dates mentioned.

That's the bad news. The good news is this: the Dow may never drop to that point for two main reasons:

1. Heavy government intervention aimed at recapitalizing the markets, so much so that it is historically unprecedented. This was the fundamental mistake of the Depression era. Hoover did nothing and it hurt our economy for a long time.
   
2. Bargains are beginning to be noticed by buyers. For example, according to the same Wall Street Journal report, out of 9,194 stocks tracked by Standard and Poor's Compustat research service, 3,518 are now trading at less than eight times their earnings over the past year. One extreme example is Charles Schwab which has $27.8 billion in cash on hand yet the stock market values the company at $21 billion! Wow! Talk about undervalued!

"The market is moving on fear, not facts," said Eugene White a Rutgers University economics professor who was citing the main similarity in our time with the Great Depression.

What does all of this mean? Well, like I said, keep your investment radars on high alert, we are in for an investment opportunity of a lifetime. I don't suggest jumping in right now, like I said, the fear is just beginning to gain momentum and you don't want to deal with a drop from 8,000 to 5,500 in the next few months (if that happens, I'm not necessarily saying it will, but it could). I'm not sure when I'll pull the trigger and start buying into the market, but I can gaurantee that I am not going to let this opportunity slip away only for me to look back on it in 8 years (which it may take that long ;) and say "Man, I wish I would have put money in back then, the market is at 18,000 right now!"

Let me also be clear that this "opportunity" is really only suitable for those who have a long-term investment plan (long-term defined as 20+ years). If you are in your 20's or early 30's and need to invest for retirement, the upcoming months (possibly even weeks, but that's starting to get risky) are an awesome time for you to start doing so. What that means is, people who may be in need of the money in the short term should not mess with this market, it will probably eat your savings to shreds (even more than it has already) and you may not have the money when you need it the most. This is not an investment strategy for retirees! But for us youngin's, we'd be crazy to not plan on getting in soon.

Also, I would never suggest that anyone invest without professional help. Not knowing what you're doing can cause grief and heartache even if the overall market is strong.

Mac Must Go On The Attack

How John McCain is trailing right now, I'll never understand. His only issue is that he's old and his running mate struggles for legitimacy in the media. Obama, on the other hand, has hosts of issues. Why the Bill Ayers thing doesn't make people sick and disgusted with Obama I'll never understand. Why can't we lay it down as an obvious principle of presidential criterion that the candidate cannot have ties to admitted and proud-of-their-wickedness terrorists? Is that too much to ask? Am I weird? I must be weird, because so many Americans (if you trust the polls) think that's okay.

Furthermore, why we can think to give someone with zero experience in doing anything significant the reigns to the free world I'll never understand. How we can think that Obama will get on-the-job training enough for him to lead effectively the largest and most complex economy on Earth I'll never understand. Why we can gloss over and think insignificant Obama's long list of close radical associates I'll never understand. Why we can drink his empty political Kool Aid till our mouth is red I'll never understand. How we can accept his do-nothing, non-voting senatorial record as something not indicative of his overall abilities I'll never understand.

What will it take for America to awaken from this deep drunkenness of political showmanship? What will it take for America to see Obama for who he is - a radical, liberal socialist? What does it take for McCain to convince America that Obama is, in fact, too dangerous, far too dangerous, for America? What will McCain need to do to win this campaign and free us from liberal radicalism with all it's abortion-loving, law-abiding-gun-owner-hating, free-market-suppressing, gay-marriage-embracing ideology? I'll tell you what it will take, it will take the American people to stand for something. To stand up for what we believe in. To fight against the tide of liberal secularism. To re-enthrone principles of discipline and morality. To reestablish the Founding Fathers original intentions of proper government.

In short, McCain must go on the attack. He must bring Obama's shady shenanegans to light. He must attack the core of Obama's leftist ideologies which are so out of touch with classic Americana. He must advertise, speak at rallies, go on every TV talk show (and don't leave Letterman high and dry, boy was that a dumb mistake), get in every major newspaper, rally influential bloggers and get busy exposing Obama's ridiculous past.

If McCain fails in this, heaven hope that Obama surprises me. As for right now, I am disgusted.

Making the Web Work for Your Small Business

While I don't own my own business, I often think about ideas of how to do things if I were to own my own PR firm or any other kind of business for that matter. My ideas mostly stem from using the resources on the web. There are tons of resources available that probably only a fraction of small business owners know about. Here are a few, relative to the typical needs or departments in a business:

IT - IT is a huge expense for every business. Technology changes so rapidly that it seems like if you don't have a team of computer scientists working for you, you'll be behind the times. Here are some ideas for the business man on a budget:

1. For CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software, Salesforce.com sounds like a powerful, flexible and affordable solution.
2. For email, calendar management and collaboration software, I think just using Google Apps for business with Gmail with Google Calendar and Google Docs would be a very powerful and cost-effective solution. And you can get personalized domain names so when you give your email address out it doesn't say soandso@gmail.com, instead it can say whatever your domain happens to be, like soandso@ITsolutions.com or whatever. Google Apps also integrates well with Salesforce.com.
3. For website management, you could hire someone from Asia to do it for cheap through www.Offshoring.com, or if you have a little web design experience (or at least know how to use Adobe Flash and Dreamweaver a little bit) you could just purchase a template from www.FlashMint.com and customize it to your business. Or if you're really bad at web design or know nothing about it, you can use Microsoft Office Live Small Business where they have a really easy and simple way to build and manage a website.
   
4. Along with websites, another thing to do is use Google Analytics for high-quality website analytics that don't cost a fortune like offerings from Omniture or other high-end web optimization companies. You could also use Google Webmaster Tools and Google Insight for help with search engine optimization.
5. For conference calls you can use www.calliflower.com which will allow you to set up free conference calls and give you full administrative privileges by being able to track who gets on the call and recording calls.
   

Marketing - marketing seems to be the one area of a business that eludes most small business owners. We cringe at the thought of going into business without knowing how to sell or market our great product or service. Well, here again, some resources on the web can help.

1. For logos and graphic design help, you can use www.logoworks.com where for just $100 you can get a professionally designed logo. Normally these types of services cost thousands of dollars by going through a typical graphic designer or ad agency. They can also help with letterheads, brochures and other print marketing materials.
   
2. For public relations (and search engine optimization) you can use www.prweb.com where for just $200 you can send out a search engine optimized press release that will get posted on Google News and Yahoo News within hours. It is also a great way for you to get your name in front of journalists who might want to do a story on you or your company.
3. Also for added publicity, you can get an ad in the Radio-TV Interview Report, a magazine read by radio and TV producers who look through it for potential guests and show ideas. Got a new book? Put in an ad! They may just call and ask you to do an interview on the radio!
4. Don't forget the other free or cheap outlets such as Craigslist.org, Ebay, Amazon and others.
5. You can also use social networks such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter as means of promoting yourself or your business. But be careful, you don't want your friends to start blocking you because all you've sent them is spam.
   

Accounting - doing the numbers and keeping up the books in any business can be challenging, especially if you don't have an accounting or finance background. Not to worry, with a little familiarity of accounting principles and some relatively cheap software from Microsoft, you'll be up and running in no time.

1. Using Microsoft Accounting Express is free and the professional version costs $200. These can be invaluable in helping you track and manage inventory, cash flow and liabilities.

That's pretty much all I have time for right now. Maybe in a later post I can go into strategic planning and organization. But hopefully this list can give you some ideas for how to run your business a little more efficiently.

Building a Financial Fortress

Given that the stock market bear has just jumped out the window and many personal investments (including our family's) have recently dropped in value significantly, I want to mention a few thoughts and ideas I've had on how to secure ourselves financially. Many of these ideas are things I'm doing currently or are thinking about doing soon. Hopefully these steps can bring a little more peace of mind during these crazy economic times.

First off, we need to pay a full tithe. What is tithing? We read about it in Malachi in the Bible and in 3 Nephi in the Book of Mormon. In those verses, God promises us that if we pay tithing (which literally means "tenth" - hence 10% of our income) he will open the windows of heaven and pour out blessings that we will not have room enough to receive them. This principle works! I have lived it and felt the blessings it brings.

Second, we must know how to do things that we can make money doing. I.e. we need to have a solid educational background, or at least valuable experience in, a job or field that will make us money. Having a strong educational background in either formal education or in a high-demand trade, is a big hedge against an economic downturn. Always learning and improving our skills is a must in a fast-pace economy.

Third, we must live below our means and save as much as possible. This means that we hate debt! Debt is like prison. It is the devils way of keeping us up at night. It leads to marital stress and emotional pain. It is a ridiculous solution to a made-up problem. I.e. we always think we "need" a new car, we "need" a bigger house than we can afford, we "need" a bunch of new clothes, we "need" a huge TV that we got from Best Buy on credit, etc. Now, don't get me wrong, debt is necessary in some rare but important cases such as buying a house, getting an education and buying real needs in emergencies like transportation food and fuel. My point is that so many people think it's normal and okay to finance two cars, to pay the minimum balance on the credit card and to max out your monthly cashflow (income) on financed things and forget about saving. I hate that I am paying the bank hundreds of dollars every month just on interest for our house. I'm grateful that our house is our only debt liability but it just makes me crazy that I owe somebody thousands of dollars and if I can't pay it, I can't keep living in our house. It will be incredibly nice when I can say "I OWN this house, not the bank, not my parents, I do and nobody can take it from me!" Hallelujah when that day comes. And if you own your house outright, way to go!!

For more on this, I would suggest reading Dave Ramsey's book "Total Money Makeover." A friend told me about it and it's a great read!

Fourth, we've got to protect what we have with insurance. I am a big fan of insurance - but the right kinds of insurance, not that whole life insurance garbage. Every husband but especially father should have life insurance. If you are relatively healthy and you get a term plan, it is really affordable. For $450 a year, if I die, my wife gets half a million bucks! She might just be giddy at the funeral for that amount! I would actually like to up the amount to around a million, because half a million invested in cd's at the bank can only yield up to $25,000 a year. That's not much considering we live off more than that right now.

Other types of insurance that we ought to have are disability and the other obvious ones like car, and health. Disability insurance is just another safeguard against the possibility of becoming disabled and not being able to provide for our families anymore. I just barely applied for disability insurance that would cover us at $2,500 per month until I'm 65. While $2,500 a month isn't a ton of money either, at least its enough to cover a small mortgage and some other neccessities.

Fifth, we must diversify our investments and hedge against inflation. I once heard a story about a man who buried $65,000 in cash in the back yard in case he needed it. Well, that was about the worst thing he could have done. The U.S. dollar is ALWAYS decreasing in value. That $65k he buried could have bought a lot more at the time he buried it than at the time he dug it up! When I was young, we had this guy in our community that was certain the government was going to collapse and the dollar would be worthless. We used to make fun of him by saying that he probably has gold and guns buried in his back yard. Well, now it's us that look silly. If he had really buried gold in his back yard when I was young (mid 90's) he would have had a great investment that would yield nearly a 30% increase today!

Recently I've been thinking that I might want to have a little physical silver or gold (around $1,000 worth, not much) in a safe place like a safe deposit box or something. That way, no matter what happens to the dollar, I would own something of intrinsic worth, something that has always been rare and used as currency since the beginning of time.

I've also been more and more drawn to CD's. Warren Buffet said that the best way to make money is to never lose it. While he knows what he's doing in the stock market and how to not lose money with stocks, I don't. But I do know how to get a CD that I know will not lose value but will only gain value (probably at barely over the rate of inflation, but hey, at least its cash that increases in value).

Sixth, in general we need to be ready for any possibility. Having stockpiles of food storage (while it sounds crazy to most people) can bring incredible peace of mind. My wife and I are starting to buy canned items in bulk and store them on a rotational basis. We buy tons of storable food but gradually draw out of the storage to cook with normally. If any of you are accountants, its a FIFO inventory process. It works really well because we buy much more than we consume and hence our food storage continues to grow.

There you have it. I hope that you are able to build for yourself a financial fortress that will protect you when the waves of economic change come crashing in!