I’ve been working for several months now with the Burke family in trying to “sell” their Ice Cream and Car Wash business.  They aren’t really “selling” it in the traditional sense; they are raffling it away.

The hardest thing we realize about this is the mentatliy that people develop right away.  They associate raffle with a 50/50.  A 50/50 is losing scenario.  If you don’t have the winning ticket you get nothing.  In this instance you get something.  A product.  The ownership of the business (1st place) or the Mercedes (2nd place) is a by product of buying a $110 key.  This purchase gets you 2 keys with $50 on each while the other $10 is the cost of the keys.

This is like buying a prepaid visa card.  However, you just use it at this business.  It can be used in the self service bays, use it in the automatic car wash, the vacuum cleaners, and best yet, to buy Ice Cream.

Like I said, the hardest mentality is people think they get nothing when the purchase the keys.

The second biggest issue is that people think that if they win, they have to keep the business.  In fact they don’t.  Shoot, the property alone is worth alot.  It can be tore down and something else built.  Whoever wins can sell it.  Either way, they make money.

Think about this, the odds of winning this business or the car is maximum odds of 1 in 6000.  The best odds would be 1 in 4000.  That’s way better than the lottery for 2 reasons. The odds are better and you can get a return of product for the $100.  What do you get with the lotto ticket?  Paper for a homeade cig!

AMABON
May 03, 2010, 6:55PM
In 1977, Democratic President Jimmy Carter was in the white house and the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. They passed and signed into law the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) which essentially was designed to prohibit lenders from NOT lending in unprofitable neighborhoods.

What could an innocent little law from 1977 possibly have to do with the mortgage and financial crisis of 2008?
Actually, not to much at the time.
The lenders were able to either squeak out a little profit from the poor neighborhoods, break even or absorb their losses during the economic boom years brought about by Reagonomics in the 80’s and the Internet boom of the 90’s.

The CRA wasn’t the worst piece of needless economic legislation the Democrats had hobbled the American people with, but rather simply a foundation on which bad policy could be built. One might say the CRA was a foothold in the door.

In 1993, Democratic President Bill Clinton was in the White House and the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress.
Clinton initiated revisions to the CRA and regulatory scheme which substantially increased the number of loans to small businesses and low and moderate-income borrowers for home loans. The revisions allowed, for the first time, the securitization of CRA loans containing subprime mortgages.
The first company to pool and repackage the loans into securities was the now defunct Bear Sterns.
Clintons strengthening of the CRA required lenders to find ways to provide mortgages to their poorer communities by loosening their underwriting standards. In other words, the banks had to make bad loans… officially called sub prime loans.
So how do you give loans to people who simply don’t qualify for loans…? Pursuant to the CRA, you get rid of objective criteria like the size of the mortgage payment relative to income, credit history, savings history and income verification. Instead, things like participation in “credit-counceling” programs were taken as evidence of an applicants ability to manage debt.

In 2003 President George Bush tried to pass what the liberal New York Times described as, “the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/11/business/new-agency-proposed-to-oversee-freddie-mac-and-fannie-mae.html?sec=&spon=&pagewanted=print
Even John McCain fought to tighten the lending standards but to no avail.
“If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose in the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole.” John McCain, 2006.

Guess the Democrats should have listened.

So in closing, we have president Carter laying the foundation for disaster with Bill Clinton worsening the situation beyond which even the best economic engine in the world could sustain, all with the help of clueless and/or corrupt Democrats along the way.

Finally, the supposedly “stupid” President George Bush attempts to bring a solution to what we KNEW was a major problem, but the Democrats blocked him.

Over the last ten years, from 1989, to 2008, the top three recipients of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac campaign contributions are:

(1) Democratic Senator Christopher Dodd and Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.
(2) President Barack Obama
(3) Democratic Senator John Kerry.

Hope and change for everyone…!

School facilitates abortion for 15 year old girl without mother’s consent.

Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
Capital Gains Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Court Fines (indirect taxes)
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax (42 cents per gallon)
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Interest Expense (tax on the money)
Inventory Tax I
RS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Local Income Tax
Luxury Taxes
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Recreational Vehicle Tax
Road Toll Booth Taxes
Road Usage Taxes (truckers)
Sales Taxes
School Tax
Septic Permit Tax
Service Charge Taxes
Social Security Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Taxes
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Nonrecurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Toll Bridge Taxes Toll
Tunnel Taxes
Trailer Registration
Tax Utility Taxes
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers’ Compensation Tax

The Tanning Tax

So we are taxed when we make money, spend money, save money, invest money — and die.
Ever look at your phone bill (if you have a land line)? Twice the bill is taxes.

Total tax percentage paid by the above average US citizen, 2005 - 54.4%

From March 23 Bloomberg Article
Insurers also will have to reveal how much of members’ premiums they spend on medical care, as opposed to executive salaries or other administrative costs. Next year, they’ll owe a rebate to customers if the insurers spend less than 80 percent on benefits for people in individual or small-group plans.

Indoor tanning salons will charge customers a 10 percent tax beginning in July in one of the changes Americans will see as a result of the U.S. health-care overhaul signed into law by President Barack Obama.

Glad I don’t tan.  I sport an all natural skin tone.

Like I said before, I don’t mind reform.  Just not reform that is rushed and passed “because”. 

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Gap-in-health-care-laws-apf-4272209396.html?x=0&.v=1

Hours after President Barack Obama signed historic health care legislation, a potential problem emerged. Administration officials are now scrambling to fix a gap in highly touted benefits for children.

Obama made better coverage for children a centerpiece of his health care remake, but it turns out the letter of the law provided a less-than-complete guarantee that kids with health problems would not be shut out of coverage.

abcsoupdot:

robot-heart-politics:

ziatroyano:

As much as we would like to join the celebration of the House’s passage of the health bill last night, in good conscience we cannot. We take no comfort in seeing aspirin dispensed for the treatment of cancer.

Instead of eliminating the root of the problem - the profit-driven, private health insurance industry - this costly new legislation will enrich and further entrench these firms. The bill would require millions of Americans to buy private insurers’ defective products, and turn over to them vast amounts of public money.

The hype surrounding the new health bill is belied by the facts:

• About 23 million people will remain uninsured nine years out. That figure translates into an estimated 23,000 unnecessary deaths annually and an incalculable toll of suffering.
• Millions of middle-income people will be pressured to buy commercial health insurance policies costing up to 9.5 percent of their income but covering an average of only 70 percent of their medical expenses, potentially leaving them vulnerable to financial ruin if they become seriously ill. Many will find such policies too expensive to afford or, if they do buy them, too expensive to use because of the high co-pays and deductibles.
• Insurance firms will be handed at least $447 billion in taxpayer money to subsidize the purchase of their shoddy products. This money will enhance their financial and political power, and with it their ability to block future reform.
• The bill will drain about $40 billion from Medicare payments to safety-net hospitals, threatening the care of the tens of millions who will remain uninsured.
• People with employer-based coverage will be locked into their plan’s limited network of providers, face ever-rising costs and erosion of their health benefits. Many, even most, will eventually face steep taxes on their benefits as the cost of insurance grows.
• Health care costs will continue to skyrocket, as the experience with the Massachusetts plan (after which this bill is patterned) amply demonstrates.
• The much-vaunted insurance regulations - e.g. ending denials on the basis of pre-existing conditions - are riddled with loopholes, thanks to the central role that insurers played in crafting the legislation. Older people can be charged up to three times more than their younger counterparts, and large companies with a predominantly female workforce can be charged higher gender-based rates at least until 2017.
• Women’s reproductive rights will be further eroded, thanks to the burdensome segregation of insurance funds for abortion and for all other medical services.

via pnhp.org

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