THE DEPARTMENT OF LABOR WANTS TO CONTROL YOUR STOCK BROKER

The Department of Labor wants to force stock brokers to meet the same fiduciary requirements as investment advisers according to an article in The Wall Street Journal of August 10th.
This means that your stock broker cannot advise you to buy or sell any particular stock because his brokerage firm may have a position in that stock. Since brokerage firms usually have positions in a large number of stocks and bonds, they will probably not be able to say yes or no on any buy or sell order you ask them for advice on.
The larger firms may not want to handle your small accounts anymore especially if they are managing your accounts.
So you might have to liquidate your IRA and move the money elsewhere.
By the way as soon as you liquidate your IRA into cash, you better be careful or the IRS will take a big tax bite out of your retirement funds.
Contact your Congressmen and make it known that you don't want the DOL to mess with your broker or your accounts!
Why the hell is the DOL getting involved with stock brokers anyway? That should be the SEC's business.
Please spread the word about this headache.

THE POLITICS OF OBSTRUCTION

The Congress is not getting America's problems solved. Why? Because the present political scene in Washington D.C. is a continuous partisan battle. The Republicans try to stop any legislation submitted by the Democrats and the Democrats do the same to the Republicans.
Now if everything was fine in America and Americans had plenty of jobs, maybe a "do-nothing" Congress would be all right.
But America has problems that need attention. The budget needs to be balanced. The National Debt needs to be reduced. American infrastructure is decaying. Entire industries have been lost to foreign manufacturers. Unemployment is too high. Companies are using part-time help to avoid paying benefits and medical insurance. Immigration problems persist. The list goes on and on.
I think that present Congressmen are going to find out that citizens are very upset with them in the next election, and the feelings will be to "turn the bums out." I hope that happens and we get some new people in Congress, representatives and senators, who are willing to work together to find solutions to our problems.
Perhaps we need moderate independents in Congress that can get necessary work done, instead of the fighting and bickering politics of the partisan, extreme right, or extreme left people we have in Congress now.
All you have to do is to listen to some of the speeches that Republicans and Democrats in Congress make and you will hear that virtually every speech they make has a partisan slant to it, if not blatantly and obviously obstructive to the party opposite to the one they represent.
So voters, get ready. Let's "turn the bums out"! 

FREE TRADE VS. FAIR TRADE

What does "free trade" do to the USA?
Here is the way it works in the USA :  The USA allows virtually anything to be imported without any tariffs which means that foreign suppliers can ship in any kind of goods at much lower prices than suppliers in the USA can ever hope to match. While goods made in the USA are usually too expensive to have any hope of selling overseas, or at least not in large quantities.
So the USA has lost entire industries such as textiles, consumer electronics, tools, household goods, and miscellaneous gadgets, etc.
Other USA industries have been hit hard with heavy competition and loss of sales to foreign companies.
So what is the solution?
The solution is to scrap free trade and start doing fair trade. What I mean by fair trade is that goods shipped into the USA either must be priced at a level that USA industries can compete on an equal basis, or import duties (tariffs or taxes) will be imposed on the foreign supplier's goods until their equivalent cost per unit is adjusted to the point where USA industries have a fair chance to compete and produce equivalent merchandise.
Why should we have fair trade?
Because, our first priority should be to help our own manufacturing base grow to provide more jobs for people. With our present very slow recovery and 7.4% unemployment, we need this boost.
It should no longer be our business to sacrifice ourselves to assist third world countries. We have plenty of our own problems with decaying infrastructure and lost manufacturing capability.
Another factor to consider is that when our manufacturing base is weak, we lose technology and the ability to respond to emergencies, military or otherwise.
So tell me if I am wrong. Should we have free trade or fair trade?