TheWiseOldFart

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart “America is a business, not a country.” This was a line spoken by Brad Pitt in a movie more than a decade ago. Sadly, it is based on fact. In 2024 our nation’s greedy corporations have left capitalism behind, and have created a Plutocracy. Our country’s 760+ billionaires have complete control of the former Grand Old Party, and partial control over some Democrats. They make every decision which will affect your life and the lives of those you love. At the top of the “worst of the worst” is America’s petroleum industry. They have lied to the American people throughout my 77 years. Whenever they find the smallest excuse, they raise prices unnecessarily. Although they have few restrictions about where they are allowed to drill for oil and gas, no new refineries have been built in more than three decades. THE TRANSPORT AND DRILLING FOR PETROLEUM PRODUCTS ARE  DANGEROUS TO HUMAN LIFE AND THE ENVIRONMENT Drilling for petroleum products is a dangerous profession. Even m

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   The quality of life for most Americans is in decline. One small and exclusive group is responsible for this situation: America’s corporations. Something you will never hear from the mainstream media: most working-class men and women dislike if not hate the super-rich. They don’t care about us and live their pitiful lives spending huge amounts of money on things they don’t need, while most of us fear the possibility of a single disaster destroying our futures. The media claims that inflation is becoming less of a problem in our country. To put it simply and accurately, “they are full of s**t.” Greedflation continues. My grocery bills remain 30-40 percent higher than they were two years ago. Gas prices in my state continue to hover around four dollars per gallon. My utility bill rose 60 percent, and they will never be reduced. If you are like me, you rely on a fixed income. Although my cost of living has risen about 40 percent on average, my social security chec

  Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   Grocery prices, up more than 30 percent: Energy bills raised by more than 50 percent: Tickets for movies increased by 100 percent or more: Tickets for sporting events and concerts higher by as much as 1,000 percent: Amusement Parks have increased they prices to a level completely unaffordable to the average family: and Restaurant prices have become too expensive, preventing anyone from enjoying the experience more than once or twice a year. The Social Security increase for 2024 was a meager 3.2 percent. All these facts are the result of corporate greed and their arrogance which allows them to believe that their bloated profits will continue to increase. Capitalism and its extension, a plutocracy, cannot exist if the nation’s citizens lack an income which allows them to purchase goods and services. Both the 2010 and 2020 Decennial Census exposed one fact which could end corporate dominance in America. Accounting for inflation, the average American worke

  Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   Trump has always believed that he is above the law. His life of crime is fraught with tales of financial crime and sexual misconduct. During the 2016 campaign he claimed that he “could shoot someone in Times Square and nothing would happen.” In 2018 and 2021, Moscow Mitch McConnell offered Trump proof that he was indeed above the law when he refused to conduct a fair trial after he was impeached twice by the House. In past articles I have proven that America’s entire justice system is broken from the cops on the street to the current biased Supreme Court. The rich and powerful are never treated fairly by law enforcement, or the courts. I only need to offer one situation to prove my allegation involving Donald John Trump. On January 6, 2021, he committed treason and yet he remains a free man. Later it was confirmed that he was hiding classified documents, including those related to nuclear power, in violation of the Espionage Act, the same act which was

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   From FBI Director Christopher Wray: “Domestic terrorism is the greatest threat to the American people.” Everyone remembers the name Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995 where 168 innocents were murdered, 19 of them small children. The media reported stories about Ted Kaczynski, dubbed “The Unabomber,” for 17 years, beginning in 1978. However, domestic terrorism is much more common in our country than reported by the media. Large events receive the headlines, but mass shootings continue to happen more frequently than the number of days on the calendar. After the cowardly attacks on 9/11, Republican politicians misdirected the facts related to domestic terrorism and focused their attacks on all Muslims, insinuating that they were all enemies of the United States. The truth is that the greatest danger lies within our own people, and it is related to uncontrolled gun violence and the greed of those involved in their manufacture and sales

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart     If you are like me and my wife, you are a member of one-half of our country’s population and fear many things which could place us heavily in debt and even homeless. At ages 77 and 73, we could face a medical emergency at any moment, not one of which we have sufficient income to pay for the exorbitant cost of caring for such a devastating situation .    Fact: medical care in the United States is the most costly and least effective in the free world. Only the wealthy can afford the best doctors and the best hospitals. The average cost of a single night’s stay in a hospital is ludicrous.   “ Recent statistics show the price of a one-night hospital stay is around: $13,600 with Medicare; $9,800 with Medicaid; $10,900 with private insurance; and $9,300 without insurance .”   Millions of Americans remain without any healthcare. My wife and I have Medicare part "A,” but are unable to afford Medicare part “B.” No other nation in the world forces their senio

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   Not a single “Republican” is qualified to lead our nation. This is not an opinion, it is a fact. If they claim to be patriots and love their country’s people, they are lying. They are all hypocrites who ignore the vast majority of our nation’s people in lieu of their super-rich owners. In the ignorant, red state of Iowa, Trump and his primary rival, the worst governor in our nation, Ron DeSantis, met head-to-head on Saturday evening. (I decided to begin this with a laugh. Two old, braindead, would-be fascists professing to love their country while lying every time they open their pie holes.) First, an honest observation. If these two ugly, angry, old white men are the best the once Grand Old Party has to offer, the “Republican Party” is dead and gone forever. Even the hypocrisy of Mitt Romney cannot convince men and women with average intelligence that Trump should be nominated by a party which was once known as the “Party of Lincoln.” He is an insult not only

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   Moscow Mitch McConnell is the Senate minority leader, serving his 7 th term. He is 81 years of age. Recently, he took a fall and later was led off a stage during a news conference as he was unable to speak. He is too old and unfit to serve the people of Kentucky or our nation. Fact: the average age of our nation’s people is 38.9 year of age. The average age of Congress is 64 years of age. 54 senators are over 65. In the House, there are 141 men and women who qualify for social security. The largest demographic belongs to millennials. Pure white Americans are declining to reproduce, while Black Americans and Hispanics continue to have children. Our nation is becoming younger, and the Senate, older. Our government does not represent our people. One other statistic which applies: women compose 51 percent of our population, but approximately 27 percent of our federal government is composed of women. Republicans have a total of 40, only 7.5 percent of the total. E

Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   My wife and I did two things today. I purchased gas for our truck, and she went grocery shopping. We live in Northern Nevada, and we are both in our 70s. Gas is nearly four-and-one-half dollars a gallon, about 20 cents higher than the last time I went to the gas station. Our grocery bill was over 30 percent higher than last week. We noticed that several items, no luxuries, had risen by more than 50 cents each, To make it worse, many of the packaged goods were higher in price but the content was less. Last year our COLA increase for social security was 8.7 percent. However, the reality is that our personal cost of living has increased by 15-18 percent. I learned the increase for this year is expected to be about three percent. This is another form of “agism” by our uncaring government. What is continuing to happen is “Greedflation.” After we survived the Covid-19 pandemic, America’s corporations took advantage of the privilege given to them by those who were el

  Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   Over this weekend there have been multiple mass shootings in America. Tens-of-thousands of Israelis are marching in the streets as their government moves closer to fascism. The Russian military attacked a cathedral in Ukraine. Millions of Americans remain without healthcare, and the majority of our nation’s people continue to struggle financially. However, Republicans in Washington have bigger concerns. They continue to attack President Biden for his many accomplishments, they are attacking all liberals and even members of their own party. They remain desperate to find “dirt” on Hunter Biden, and they continue to admit they are the party of racism, misogyny, homophobia, anti-Semitism, and xenophobia, spreading anger, hatred, and violence in all 50 states. The safety of the American people, nor their quality of life are of little or no importance to these right-wing extremists. Nearly 100 percent of all those who claim to be “Republicans” have only one

  Op-ed by TheWiseOldFart   I try to be professional. Although I occasionally use profanity, I don’t like or enjoy it. However, the truth is it’s time for all Americans to face reality and the truth and save their country from the villains among us. As a young man, I listened to a speech by an animatronic Abraham Lincoln at Disneyland in a long-forgotten attraction named, “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln.” This speech impressed me and although it has often been misquoted, Its meaning is more important today than ever. "At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide." The former were his exact words and If he were alive today, he would know that he was not only a great President, but also a great prophet. Over the last 42