Hey US Citizens!  Are we happy with the results of the 2008 elections now?  Is this what all of you that voted for President Obama wanted?

I understand why the country wanted a change from the Bush administration.  That was certainly a legitimate objective.  Did all of you really want to go as far left as we have gone so far?

It looks like the US government will own a big piece of General Motors very soon.  Isn't this just wonderful?  We effectively own AIG, a number of banks and auto companies.  I can't even criticize the French any more regarding government ownership of businesses.

Defense is the name of the game.  All of us need to work hard to defend ourselves from our government.  Before too long we will have our taxes raised to the moon to pay for all of the government debt and programs Obama is piling up.

TPM

We can't seem to escape attack politics in the US.  Every day our television monitors and computer screens are filled with attacks from one side to the other which contribute absolutely nothing to moving the country forward.  It is truly disgusting to see a bunch of loser politicians from both parties argue about issues that really don't matter very much in the big picture.

Why can't these "national leaders" spend a few minutes actually working on the really big issues that our country faces?  The problem is we don't have any national political leaders.  We have people that pretend to be leaders because they hold a title that indicates leadership.  They don't show any true characteristics of great leaders.  They come across as small petty people that don't have any backbone.  They attack each other rather than working to convince the rest of us that they have the ideas and plans to drive the country forward.

As the bickering continues my respect for our national politicians continues to decline.  Many US citizens are concerned about the future of our nation.  They should be concerned.  The quality of our national leaders has been declining for decades as the political environment has degraded.  There is not one national leader in Washington that will look the people in the eye and have an honest discussion about the really big issues. 

The national media is not helping the process.  Our media is mostly liberal with a few conservative outlets.  The media appears to desire to increase the bickering because it will be good for ratings.  We don't get much honest news anymore.  All we are getting is some commentator's political spin disguised as a news person or program host.

Our nation will continue to decline in every respect until we have political leaders step forward that will stand among the people in the purple zone and speak the truth about what we must do to put ourselves on a path forward that makes sense for our entire nation.

TPM

Today President Obama stepped in front of the TV cameras to attack major US corporations for not paying enough taxes on their foreign earnings.  He is going to tax those US companies that create jobs overseas and "reward" those that create jobs into the US.

While it is likely that there are some companies and some individuals that are purposefully avoiding paying US taxes through foreign accounts, it is more likely that fundamental business economics play a greater role in the flow of funds by major companies and high net worth individuals.  Why would any person or any company purposefully pay more cash taxes any earlier than needed to any taxing jurisdiction?  Only a fool would do that!

We seem to forget that many major US companies have foreign businesses that produce their goods and services overseas to serve overseas markets.  Due to the nature of their businesses the production must take place in the local market or region.  There is no export opportunity in many situations.  The jobs will never be in the US.  All that will happen is the company trying to conserve its foreign profit will have to pay more US taxes if Obama's proposal goes forward.

The net result of Obama's strategy will likely be a reduction of taxes as big companies spin-off their foreign subsidiaries to shareholders and locate their new headquarters in a low tax foreign locations.  These big companies are obligated to their shareholders to take actions of this type if the net impact on the value of the company warrants such a move.

The other item that our new President needs to learn is that we have a global labor market.  Unskilled and semiskilled US labor in manufacturing and many service industries must be competitive against similarly skilled labor in China, India and other low cost labor centers. 

Many people object to working for very low wages and claim the US worker is more productive.  That may be true but a US worker that is three times as productive as an Asian worker can't be paid 10 times the total hourly cost. There is no longer any demand for expensive semiskilled or unskilled labor.  The US is not an island where its citizens can live in a labor cost environment that is isolated from the rest of the world.  World War II ended 64 years ago!  This is no longer the 1950's or even the 1960's!  US labor compensation must reflect its global market value not some artificial government target.

The US can continue to try to avoid this problem, deny it exists and make political decisions that don't match market reality.  In the end the markets will win and the US government will be forced to adapt to market reality.  The global markets are far stronger than any government over the long term.  Government interference in legitimate market trends will just make things worse for the affected people in the long term.

Mr. President, you need some fundamental lessons in how markets work.  You need to get back to basics.

TPM