its true – my father’s father’s father was a republican in Maine.  when my dog showed me an eagles breakfast and then the next day a young male bald eagle flew right up to me – landing about 10 feet away on a teetering tree – displaying excellent balance and lift with wings to keep the tree from collapsing too quickly but looking intently at me – checking me out.  we respectively sat or stood and looked at each other. His parents have come round the last few years staying with us about a week – perhaps he had seen me through the windows which line the back of the house with us visible from where we would see them sitting.  they sat and looked at us many times.

the eagle was saying in essence pay attention and speak up for your ancestors. remember how passionate your father was in later years about being a republican – so – here i am writing this.

american republican principles

• invest in infrastructure – its a no brainer- our US based business gets the benefit of excellent transportation and infrastructure to support US based business.
• privacy for adults consenting for private behavior – totally none of the government’s business. – the same for what their religion is, medical decisions, what they need to ingest to get through the day
• healthcare – 3% annual tax on wealth over 10 million pays for free healthcare for everyone, private insurance has a role to provide faster or more specialized services such as exists in the UK where there is a reasonable market.  great healthcare was not only a big business benefit, but it was also moral to recognize that many are less fortunate, and need help best financed by the very wealthy.  all religions speak in some ways on the moral necessity of helping those less fortunate.
• taxes – no deductions, no difference in income – has to fit one 1 page, simple, but graduated
• you pay for government, courts, police, prisons, military, transportation through a tax on business and a tax on income – some national some regional. 
• while sobriety has its many virtues, when people make decisions about what to ingest psychic substances is no business of the government other than taxation.  addiction should be treated for what it is – a medical problem.
• a real republican would be known as broad minded, mature, not prone to lose his temper, a good business sense, impeccable record of moral probity. – i had to look up probity after writing it, – honesty, honor, integrity, uprightness of character,

the US is and always was the one place where your religion did not matter, your race or creed, and where you came from. if you worked hard, played by the rules, and did your best then a comfortable live was ahead. If you were brilliant you made everybody’s lives better and were rewarded.

my father always used to say – never trust a politician, a preacher, someone who wants to tell you how to live. Never trust the bombast, the showman, the ego obsessed person looking out for himself.  never trust a gambler.  never trust the scantimonious, the slinger of hate.  Never listen to someone defined by what they are anti.

do trust the mature, successful, broad minded and good natured among you. the road to hell is paved with the intention of enforcing their version of heaven.  it is with those that are broadminded, mature, slow to anger that you should entrust your vote, not those using anti-positions claiming to know Jesus, when all they know is mithra and manipulation

people are angry, and have a good reason to be, but anger is not the way to solve the problem.

fear is a terrible motivator, often making us do destructive actions.

everyone just wants to be left alone to have fun and get on with it.  they understand that good roads, good police, good government, powerful military are good and that some taxes have to be paid to support it – but it has to be fair.

success will follow from the real republican principles enumerated above, but more specifically:

• if medical problems are not a terrible burden, then the population is healthier, costs less money – better for US based business.  what has become known as Obamacare was originally a republican think tank creation, it was Obama trying to live up to his stated desire to compromise.
• if educational opportunity for talent and intelligence is unlimited, and available to everyone for free then you get the best from everyone’s unique talent.  access to some higher education is by region or national level testing to qualify for free education – similar to other places that provide free education.  the alternative to – maybe not a master pr PHD would be help and training to establish productive business, art, their passionate dreams to make things better in some way.
• if drugs are treated as a medical problem then opiate addiction, meth, alcohol, can be regulated, taxed, and when advisable medical intervention for addiction.  the current system only benefits criminals and the trapped are treated to a for profit judicial system for dubious benefit to the public and law abiding citizens having to seek street heroin to satisfy their addiction instead of being able to go to their doctor and have a discussion which may mean you get a maintenance dose every day. and the crying shame is that the taliban and their ilk often get the bulk of their funding from drug trafficking – that could stop tomorrow with this policy.
• we need to make love more, support neighborhood activities like social dancing, but what slows us down are anger that is real and deserved.

1. debt from educational loans having to come before money for food
2. having property for generations, and loosing in a bank swindle in the last decade
3. working hard at a local minimum wage job does not pay for the minimum to live
4. glitz and glamor TV shows us how the 1% live – and we want some of that

so importantly how do you pay for all this:

1. medical care of all sorts is paid by a 3% annual tax on wealth above some threshold like 10 million
2. government is paid for by taxes that are incredibly simple but graduated.  a simple tax is fine as long as you increase the tax rate every increase by every order of magnitude.  for instance
3. – income up to 10,000 – 1%
4. 10,000 to 100,000 10%
5. 100,000 to 1 million 20%
6. 1 million to 10 million 30%
7. 10 million to 100 million 40%
8. 100 million to a billion 50%
9. billion to 10 billion 60%
10. 10 billion to 100 billion 70%

i am not saying these should be the numbers, just as an illustration of how some better practices in other countries do it.

the current system of different types of income and deductions is ripe for corruption, campaign funding bribes, etc – it is a cesspool – eliminate it.  my father hated social engineering through tax change.

all subsidies of all types of energy should be eliminated.  solar and wind have reached economic equivalency even if you ignore the cost of carbon being put into the atmosphere.

flat rate varied by levels of income.  no deductions, no exceptions, just how much did you make from any and all sources.

it can be simple, but fair,  its done in many places around the world.

you could make US citizenship require paying tax on global wealth.  business that wants to have substantial either production or markets in the US needs to pay a tax on global corporate wealth.  stop the criminals from funding off shore, island fronts for laundering and stealing. the cost small countries of northern europe historically but now worldwide criminal banks help shield the criminal activity for a fee.

to the extent our trading partners participate – an equitable sharing of global taxation could be achieved – i believe that it is the criminals that have prevented the transparency and authority and benefitted most from it.  if you are large wealthy company with lots of off-shore billions not subject to tax – this is a pressing question.  reasonable people could come to a sharing based on measured economic activity in a country versus other countries where many global companies like the one i worked for had known splits of revenue from each region – simple to calculate.  it would put the off-shore offices with an answering machine and a local lawyer covering for them as a sham office for tax purposes – who could think that is a good thing.

to make it real simple, if over 60% of your economic activity is in the US – then you should be subject to the graduated simplified tax.  again if you are a large wealthy company you could bring the money home but be subject to a know tax.  because it would be a much larger pool of revenue that is being measured – the rate would go down.

there are shared services local, regional, national and international where a usage fee model makes sense, for instance my father thought pollution was primarily an economic argument – someone was stealing your clean air, clean water, national resources.  If you camp out on public land, using public land resources, then consider paying for it.

investment in leading edge GRID infrastructure, transportation of all types including high speed people movers, taking advantage of renewable opportunities, not by creating a new tax break, but eliminate all of the subsidies for fossil fuels. break down monopoly abuse and ensure a fair shake for the unknown little person who is willing to work hard and live in harmony with all of the other wonderful folks in our country

the eagle that started this tale, watched me calmly, just intently taking me in, as i walked for a few minutes and the eagle had chosen wisely for its perch – it could see a long ways down my normal path, so as i was about to go out of sight i bowed to the eagle hoping that he comes around often.  As we parted he told me to ask on behalf of all lovers of the US to refer to someone now in politics as the rump.  yes – i know an eagle talking to me sounds strange, but not more strange than flying right up to me and calming checking me out.

why rump, well for some people the t is silent, and on his birth certificate the method of delivery is listed as “ the other”.

when i first learned this my comment was that it explained a lot.

so due to the silent T, we will always use the word rump.  trust me if you use rump people will still know who you are talking about

some wondered about the other, clearly if had been cesarian, or forceps, it would have been listed as such.

some now knew why the rump had been so obsessed with birth certificates – given his own guilty secret it could explain the obsession – not what they thought it always was – a thinly veiled comment on ancestry from someone having failed at everything else wants to the center of attention at all times and would use racism, bigotry, the worst instincts of people to make money, hence the profession of building failed gambling establishments and associating with criminal elements which is how most of us who grew up around NY remember the rump – daddy’s little boy – the rich buffoon who just turned out to be an a-hole in more ways than one.

once with unlimited power will be the world’s worst nightmare – like Putin one of his kleptocratic pals, able to gamble away all of our assets and then after some awful years make it even worse. 

is there anyone who does not think that Putin is a thug, a criminal, having stolen the kleptocratic minimum these days of at least 66 billion. do we not remember the crimea and ukraine?  is there anyone who does not think that under the rump it would be any different except now it would be here at home – not in some place other there?

so rump, it is.

ok, so if not the rump, who tells you the right things about these simple republican principles, certainly not:

• the very scary dracula from somewhere – until fairly recently still a citizen of Canada – and do not get me wrong – i love canada, but really if it was me – and i loved my new country – i would have gotten around to changing the canadian citizenship status decades ago. –
• while i have a diminished capacity for anger and usually wish all people well, using the name of Jesus to justify mythric practices and exploitation of the simple minded of faith, it would be better to have a millstone tied around your neck and thrown to the bottom of the sea – to quote the scriptures.  when Jesus was taken to the top of the mountain and the reviled one, the most cursed, said bow down before me and all this will be yours, most people do not turn around and stick their butts in the air.  i am sorry for the crudity of the reference but i honestly think that is what happened since from what i know of Jesus (of which i make no particular claim or entitlement other than reason and observation as God has bestowed) is that you would be at the front of the list of people to whom he would say – begone, i do not know you.  your actions and your life have nothing to do with the life i preached.  if you are mad or perplexed please read james, yes the book in the bible, my intentions are loving even if i am not holding my tongue – i have to blame the eagle and hope that if offense is taken that you can forgive my failings
• people can see that when they meet him – the faustian bargain. that instant dislike, the sense of being ill at ease in is skin, clear demonic possession from one perspective
• “republicans” could choose a former governor, who many of my Ohio friends did not like, but at least has some clue about what real government is.
• real government is the artful search for agreement and effect non-patronage efficient execution of those agreements, sort of the opposite of shutting down the government because – dammit i want my way!
• there is an independent running, well ok he is running now as a democrat, but don’t hold that against him – at least he is talking about the right subjects, and has a proven track record of being practical, not dogmatic – funnily enough when you look at the old republican teachings much of Bernie’s platform is more in line than the other side of the argument.

the attack being used against Bernie is – how do you pay for all that – you are just getting the votes who want something for nothing

1. healthcare – if you check the numbers 3% annual tax on wealth over 10 million pays for free healthcare for all
2. education is paid by tax on business – but more often as a result of licensing of valuable research coming from the educational institutions and the research paid for by all of us – now often it is the lucky, the intellectually gifted, the powerfully connected that can take advantage of inventions paid for by eduction, why not open that up to free enterprise to license instead of giving it away
3. senior care including social security – simple, increase the amount subject to the tax but look at ways of making it simpler and easier especially for transitions for different types of needs – this solves a huge problem for many working class families dealing with very expensive assisted living or end of life situations.
4. infrastructure – banks are being paid to hold money – use that unique market opportunity to show the world a positive willingness to invest in the future, want to make the world great, be willing to invest in the future

i know there are contrarians who oppose everything – but we should ignore them.