Most of you that would ever read my blog know that I have had a recent transformation. Physically I am in the best shape of my life since I was probably in my third year in college. Here is how:
I have lost to this point 84 pounds since around August. My goal is 100 by August and 110 by September. To do this I have had to make a ton of changes but those changes were not as hard as many would think.
Nothing is as hard when you have motivation. I have had a lot of support from new friends and one in particular in the last year. I love them all so much. I have been inspired and motivated for many reasons that I will not go into but the reality is just as my brother Brad Raby mentioned in church a couple weekends ago, motivation is so important. You who want to and are trying to lose weight... find friends and close love ones that will hold you accountable. And not just other people who need to lose weight as well. But others who are already fit. Others who are experienced and already know how to do it. And make sure they are people that don't let you slack off much. In other words family might not be best. Even old friends are not best. new friends. Friends you really like and want to impress and know that will hold you accountable.
Start off knowing that it will be hard for the first month but that if you stick to it for a month it will get easier thereafter. All things are harder at first. But if you do the right thing you will add motivation along the way. I noticed my body changing after a month and that added motivation. After two months change was obvious and after 3 or 4 people around me started to ask. And as obvious from a recent picture that I have posted change has really taken place the last couple of months.
Don't change your diet change your lifestyle. Diets die out. You need to count calories. More out than in. Scientifically figure out how many calories you can have a day and go with that. Don't try to cut out certain foods. Cut down calories that will help you decide what to cut out. What you value. The reality is that I enjoy fun from time to time. I cut out soft drinks.. Not because of the sugar but because I value other foods more. I still eat desserts but I eat a certain quantity and do not over eat as often. I eat a better breakfast to save calories for later in the day. I eat slower during the day so that I feel more full and have calories left over for the evening. I use my phone app to count calories. myfitnesspal.com It works wonders
Mix up your workouts. I started off riding my indoor bike. Its funny I would ride my bike and after so many calories I would allow myself to read a Tennessee Sports article on Govols247 a recruiting and tennessee sports site that I am a member of. From there I went to walking and some p90x. Then I started kickboxing locally at a great place. Now I am part of a gym where I run on the treadmill and lift weights. I have a local neighborhood I run at and when I want to run longer distances that are flat I do so on a big road that has a good sidewalk. The point is I don't bore myself. Mix it up a bit. Muscle confusion.
Most important of all these is the first. I have had support from my family but I'm not around my family. I have some close people to me here in Crossville that have really helped me. I cherish this help. Without it I would not have done this and would not continue to do it. Find some accountability partners guys find some people to do this with you. Find some motivation! That's what people need.
Thanks to all who have helped. You know who you are... Love you!!
PS This will continue... Live Long
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Thursday, June 6, 2013
The Folly of Franklin Roosevelt and the Myth about the Great Depression
If you read any list of greatest presidents in American history you will almost surely find Franklin D. Roosevelt on that list. In part because of what he did during the World War II Crisis. But also due to guiding us through the Great Depression. The reality is that he did not guide us THROUGH the Great Depression but is one of the main reasons we have what we will forever call "The Great Depression."
The information that you will see in this blog comes from Dr. Thomas Sowell and Dr. Walter Williams from various articles and the book "The Housing Boom and Bust."
Almost every person in America knows of the Great Depression. We study it in school. In fact the American History class that I teach has three major sections covering the stock market crash, the Great Depression, and the New Deal. All three sections are focused on the time period of the late 20's and 30's and even early 40's during a time that we call The Great Depression. For many years FDR was given credit for ending it with the New Deal. Then many said that WWII ended it but FDR's New Deal actually kept things from getting worse. But many modern economist of the last 30 years are now often blaming FDR's New Deal for having caused much of the Great Depression or at the least prolonging its demise to our nation. Lets look into it a bit.
The huge stock market crash of 1929 has for years been considered the cause of the massive unemployment of the 1930's, the period we refer to as the Great Depression. Unemployment was as high as 25 percent in 1933 and the annual rate remained above 20 percent for four consecutive years 1932 to 1935. Thousands of banks failed and stock prices fell to a fraction of their peaks in 1929. For two consecutive years, American corporations as a whole operated in the red(Sowell). Foreclosures of homes and especially farms followed and many people had to live in what we term shanty towns that were nicknamed "Hoovervilles" after the president of the time, Herbert Hoover.
His successor was Roosevelt who is regarded as the man that guided us out of the Great Depression. Roosevelt understood the need for the federal government to get involved with disasters like this that were caused by the free market of capitalism and correct the problem. But this picture or belief has again, recently been challenged by economists although historians, often primarily liberal and in love with FDR are reluctant to revise their history.
Here are the facts, Two months after the stock market crashed in October, unemployment rose and peaked at 9 percent and then began to gradually decline over the next several months all the way down to 6.3 percent by June of 1930. Then in June of 1930, Herbert Hoover signed into law the Smoot-Hawley Tariffs which raised taxes on imports to their highest in history. This was an effort to reduce imports and increase domestic production and exports to preserve American jobs. In November of 1930, unemployment reached double digits for the first time in the decade at 11.6 percent. Unemployment began to rise after the federal government got involved. It was more than a year after the stock market had crashed. In fact after two months unemployment had peaked and began to fall until the tariff bill was passed into law. Not all of this was due to the tariff laws though. Lets look deeper into it.
FDR as president involved the federal government even more so. He passed laws like the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933, which controlled prices and wages in industry. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 established federal control over prices and output in agriculture. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 mandated employers to negotiate wages and working conditions with labor unions. FDR also took us off the gold standard and issued thousands of executive orders.
"During the first year of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, he called for increasing federal spending to $10 billion while revenues were only $3 billion. Between 1933 and 1936, government expenditures rose by more than 83 percent. Federal debt skyrocketed by 73 percent. Roosevelt signed off on legislation that raised the top income tax rate to 79 percent and then later to 90 percent. Hillsdale College economics historian and professor Burt Folsom, author of "New Deal or Raw Deal?", notes that in 1941, Roosevelt even proposed a 99.5 percent marginal tax rate on all incomes more than $100,000. When a top adviser questioned the idea, Roosevelt replied, "Why not?""
In the five months leading up to the passage of the National Recovery Act, signs of recovery were evident in our economy. Factory employment was up 23% and payrolls altogether were up 35%. Then the law was passed and what was the result of raising wages and shortening work hours? In the six months after the law was passed, industrial production dropped some 25 percent according to economist Dr. Walter Williams. Even more interesting is that the Supreme Court eventually ruled this law unconstitutional. Unemployment then fell to 14 percent in 1936 and even lower by 1937.
Roosevelt had more ideas such as the Wagner Act also known as the National Labor Relations Act. This law was to improve the power of Labor Unions to help workers in the workplace.
In 1938, Roosevelt's New Deal produced the nation's first depression within a depression. The stock market crashed again, losing nearly 50 percent of its value between August 1937 and March 1938, and unemployment climbed back to 20 percent. -Williams
Roosevelt was not hated though. The chief Nazi paper at the time bragged on his policies. Roosevelt even considered the dictator Benito Mussolini as an "admirable" man whom he was impressed with and had accomplished.
FDR's very own treasury secretary, Henry Morgenthau, saw the folly of the New Deal, writing: "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. ... We have never made good on our promises. ... I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started ... and an enormous debt to boot!"
The reality is that what was a four year sharp downturn was extended to a 16 year depression due to destructive policies of Roosevelt and his New Deal agenda.
Roosevelt's administration created unpredictable interventions in the economy and businesses were impeded due to the federal involvement in the economy that caused uncertainty. Business investments remained unusually low during the New Deal era. While the government was becoming more involved, one financial historian said that throughout the 1930's "the amount banks lent for each dollar of reserved remained at about half the level of the 1920's." Unemployment remained at double digits for the entirety of Roosevelt's first two terms in office despite much economic and statistical analysis that concluded that government policies in the 1930's prolonged the depression by several years.
The stock market crashed again in 1987 in a similar way to that in 1929. Unlike Hoover and Roosevelt, Reagan did little to intervene in 1987 despite media criticisms of his inaction. The result was that the economy had to recover on its own. This led to what the British magazine The Economist later called 20 years of a combination of steady growth and low inflation. Two sharp downturns in the early 1920's were allowed to recover on their own as well and quickly did so. Remember the nickname of the 1920's? "The Roaring Twenties".
There is much more information available to describe the impact of the New Deal and statistics as far is how the economy reacted when laws were passed or repelled. Unfortunately our education system is mostly ran by big government. And any history that belittles or speaks of the weaknesses of big government might lend to a desire for reduced government involvement in our lives today.
FDR was one of the worst presidents in history domestically. I for one history teacher will speak of his strengths and weaknesses and allow others to develop their own opinions based on all sides of the history story. The Great Depression was truly caused by massive government failure that this blog only touches the surface of. I hope this opens the eyes of many readers who often buy into the belief that since so many people say it, it must be true that Roosevelt was a great president. I find it hard to believe anyone that was bragged on by two Fascist leaders could truly be that great.
The information that you will see in this blog comes from Dr. Thomas Sowell and Dr. Walter Williams from various articles and the book "The Housing Boom and Bust."
Almost every person in America knows of the Great Depression. We study it in school. In fact the American History class that I teach has three major sections covering the stock market crash, the Great Depression, and the New Deal. All three sections are focused on the time period of the late 20's and 30's and even early 40's during a time that we call The Great Depression. For many years FDR was given credit for ending it with the New Deal. Then many said that WWII ended it but FDR's New Deal actually kept things from getting worse. But many modern economist of the last 30 years are now often blaming FDR's New Deal for having caused much of the Great Depression or at the least prolonging its demise to our nation. Lets look into it a bit.
The huge stock market crash of 1929 has for years been considered the cause of the massive unemployment of the 1930's, the period we refer to as the Great Depression. Unemployment was as high as 25 percent in 1933 and the annual rate remained above 20 percent for four consecutive years 1932 to 1935. Thousands of banks failed and stock prices fell to a fraction of their peaks in 1929. For two consecutive years, American corporations as a whole operated in the red(Sowell). Foreclosures of homes and especially farms followed and many people had to live in what we term shanty towns that were nicknamed "Hoovervilles" after the president of the time, Herbert Hoover.
His successor was Roosevelt who is regarded as the man that guided us out of the Great Depression. Roosevelt understood the need for the federal government to get involved with disasters like this that were caused by the free market of capitalism and correct the problem. But this picture or belief has again, recently been challenged by economists although historians, often primarily liberal and in love with FDR are reluctant to revise their history.
Here are the facts, Two months after the stock market crashed in October, unemployment rose and peaked at 9 percent and then began to gradually decline over the next several months all the way down to 6.3 percent by June of 1930. Then in June of 1930, Herbert Hoover signed into law the Smoot-Hawley Tariffs which raised taxes on imports to their highest in history. This was an effort to reduce imports and increase domestic production and exports to preserve American jobs. In November of 1930, unemployment reached double digits for the first time in the decade at 11.6 percent. Unemployment began to rise after the federal government got involved. It was more than a year after the stock market had crashed. In fact after two months unemployment had peaked and began to fall until the tariff bill was passed into law. Not all of this was due to the tariff laws though. Lets look deeper into it.
FDR as president involved the federal government even more so. He passed laws like the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933, which controlled prices and wages in industry. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 established federal control over prices and output in agriculture. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 mandated employers to negotiate wages and working conditions with labor unions. FDR also took us off the gold standard and issued thousands of executive orders.
"During the first year of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, he called for increasing federal spending to $10 billion while revenues were only $3 billion. Between 1933 and 1936, government expenditures rose by more than 83 percent. Federal debt skyrocketed by 73 percent. Roosevelt signed off on legislation that raised the top income tax rate to 79 percent and then later to 90 percent. Hillsdale College economics historian and professor Burt Folsom, author of "New Deal or Raw Deal?", notes that in 1941, Roosevelt even proposed a 99.5 percent marginal tax rate on all incomes more than $100,000. When a top adviser questioned the idea, Roosevelt replied, "Why not?""
In the five months leading up to the passage of the National Recovery Act, signs of recovery were evident in our economy. Factory employment was up 23% and payrolls altogether were up 35%. Then the law was passed and what was the result of raising wages and shortening work hours? In the six months after the law was passed, industrial production dropped some 25 percent according to economist Dr. Walter Williams. Even more interesting is that the Supreme Court eventually ruled this law unconstitutional. Unemployment then fell to 14 percent in 1936 and even lower by 1937.
Roosevelt had more ideas such as the Wagner Act also known as the National Labor Relations Act. This law was to improve the power of Labor Unions to help workers in the workplace.
In 1938, Roosevelt's New Deal produced the nation's first depression within a depression. The stock market crashed again, losing nearly 50 percent of its value between August 1937 and March 1938, and unemployment climbed back to 20 percent. -Williams
Roosevelt was not hated though. The chief Nazi paper at the time bragged on his policies. Roosevelt even considered the dictator Benito Mussolini as an "admirable" man whom he was impressed with and had accomplished.
FDR's very own treasury secretary, Henry Morgenthau, saw the folly of the New Deal, writing: "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. ... We have never made good on our promises. ... I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started ... and an enormous debt to boot!"
The reality is that what was a four year sharp downturn was extended to a 16 year depression due to destructive policies of Roosevelt and his New Deal agenda.
Roosevelt's administration created unpredictable interventions in the economy and businesses were impeded due to the federal involvement in the economy that caused uncertainty. Business investments remained unusually low during the New Deal era. While the government was becoming more involved, one financial historian said that throughout the 1930's "the amount banks lent for each dollar of reserved remained at about half the level of the 1920's." Unemployment remained at double digits for the entirety of Roosevelt's first two terms in office despite much economic and statistical analysis that concluded that government policies in the 1930's prolonged the depression by several years.
The stock market crashed again in 1987 in a similar way to that in 1929. Unlike Hoover and Roosevelt, Reagan did little to intervene in 1987 despite media criticisms of his inaction. The result was that the economy had to recover on its own. This led to what the British magazine The Economist later called 20 years of a combination of steady growth and low inflation. Two sharp downturns in the early 1920's were allowed to recover on their own as well and quickly did so. Remember the nickname of the 1920's? "The Roaring Twenties".
There is much more information available to describe the impact of the New Deal and statistics as far is how the economy reacted when laws were passed or repelled. Unfortunately our education system is mostly ran by big government. And any history that belittles or speaks of the weaknesses of big government might lend to a desire for reduced government involvement in our lives today.
FDR was one of the worst presidents in history domestically. I for one history teacher will speak of his strengths and weaknesses and allow others to develop their own opinions based on all sides of the history story. The Great Depression was truly caused by massive government failure that this blog only touches the surface of. I hope this opens the eyes of many readers who often buy into the belief that since so many people say it, it must be true that Roosevelt was a great president. I find it hard to believe anyone that was bragged on by two Fascist leaders could truly be that great.
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