Safety Nets or Hammocks?

I am just going to jump right into this and do my best to keep each point as brief as possible.....

- You pay and your company pays USF charges on your phone bill (landline and mobile).  Do you know what this fee is?  This fee is charged so that poor people can receive subsidized phones.  It was started under Clinton, pioneered by Gore, in 1996 and intended as a home phone (copper line) service.  Under BHO, it was expanded to mobile phones.  This had led to a program that has little accountability where in 2011, phones were given to anyone who checked a box that said they were on food stamps or welfare or social security.   The facilitators (Gov't created agencies) failed to check if the person already HAD one of these $10 / month phones and failed to verify if they truly were receiving assistance.  
The result?  Loyalty of those who support a "Nanny State".....but don't take it from me.  Take it from a loyal supporter of BHO:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpAOwJvTOio

The original plan was intended to be for the Local Exchange Carriers (AT&T, Verizon, etc.) to be ....well...."forced" into providing a $10 / month phone line to poor customer's homes to assure they have a land line.  Those carriers were subsidized up to $10 / month from the Gov't.  From 1996 to 2007, the copper line availability shrinking to the point where these companies were struggling to provide facilities without major investment.  The CLEC companies (One Communications, TDS Metrocom, Windstream, etc.) stayed away from this program because they weren't forced to provide this service and didn't want to deal with the red tape.  Today, since so many companies have either gone out of business or downsized, along with millions of residential consumers abandoning their home phone for mobile, there is more copper land line capacity.  Companies such as AT&T are now...get this...ADVERTISING that they offer Gov't funded "land line" service.
Moving one to the next point.

- You pay fees to your utility provider (WPS, Vectren, etc.) to provide subsidized service to poor people.  I could bloviate, but it is a near carbon copy of the above Telecom situation.

- Your taxes pay for Welfare and Food Stamps.  In Jan 2009, there were 31.98M Americans collecting Food Stamps.  Yes, I know...that is insane.  Today, there are 46.68M on Food stamps.  That is an increase of nearly 50% in less than 4 years.  Let's break this down, but be quick about it:  BHO said that he added 5M jobs.  The unemployment rate is the same, today, as the day he took office according to reports.  Population grew, citizens turned 18, college students graduated....yeah....5M doesn't come close to covering that.  How he could state that the unemployment rate is the same is just crazy if you consider the fact that 15M more people are collecting Food Stamps! 

Ok, you are Gen-Xers, so I have to hit some points to keep you reading.

What if......

A) The Gov't actually audited (every 6 mos) those citizens who have these Obama Phones....ahem...."Landline Phone Act" phones....and utility assistance?  You have 2 or more?  Fix it!  You aren't really on assistance?  Fix it!  You now have a job.....well....now you are fixing not only the subsidized phone and utilities, but cut their welfare and food stamps!   My point:  I feel that 10% - 20% of recipients are fraudulently receiving assistance and that this would save the Gov't $25 Billion / year.  Yes.  $25 Billion!

B)  BHO is all about giving tax / surcharge dollars to the poor to help them.  My friends, this is turning safety nets into hammocks.  It is turning subsidies into entitlements.  This is draining the middle class and businesses (at all levels) which limits growth.  Do you know what takes care of all of these subsidies as well as the Health Care issue?  
JOBS!!!!!  Sadly, BHO is all about tax and subsidize (spend!) rather than job growth.

 C) Some of you who have paid attention over the past 4 years are thinking, "I thought that the President and Congress passed a $1 Trillion spending plan that was going to stimulate the economy?".  I say "good job" to you!  You are correct.  BHO was all about "shovel ready projects" that, sadly, failed to produce long term job growth.  
Here is a short list of just his "Green Energy Companies" that he funded:
Solyndra (received $535 million)
Beacon Power (received $43 million)
AES’ subsidiary Eastern Energy
Nevada Geothermal (received $98.5 million)
SunPower (received $1.5 billion)
First Solar (received $1.46 billion)
Babcock & Brown (an Australian company which received $178 million)
Ener1 (subsidiary EnerDel received $118.5 million)
Amonix (received 5.9 million)
The National Renewable Energy Lab
Fisker Automotive
Abound Solar (received $400 million)
Chevy Volt (taxpayers basically own GM)
Solar Trust of America
A123 Systems (received $279 million)
Willard & Kelsey Solar Group (received $6 million)
Johnson Controls (received $299 million)
Schneider Electric (received $86 million)

FYI, this list is a list of companies that received Gov't funding and are either failing or have already gone out of business.  This money could have funded ....well....you get it.

Thank you for reading and there will be more to come!

- Robb