Tag: TRUMP

One Piece At A Time!

Good fences make good neighbors.

one piece at a time

There has been a lot said recently concerning the most recent partial shutdown of the US government.  Just before Christmas, on December 22nd, 2018 President Trump ordered the shutdown in order to secure the funding needed to complete a barrier wall that spans the southern border of the USA from Mexico. The  continental border between the two nations is extensive, spanning 1,954 miles (3,145 km). On our side, the area affects four US states: Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. There are many sections of existing barrier wall, and even natural  barriers such as rivers and mountains. There are ‘virtual’ barriers policed by National Guard, SWAT teams, and video surveillance. Sections of the border have been fenced off one piece at a time over the years, and the US Border Patrol has been doing its part to stem the flow of illegal aliens.  Some sections of the existing walls are steel, some are concrete, and some are just barbed wire. The main point is that because of the piecemeal security measures   our southern border is currently vulnerable at some points to incursions by illegal aliens. A country without borders is NOT a country. President Trump understands this point and is committed to securing our border with Mexico, despite resistance from Democrats  and  constant criticism by liberal media outlets.  

One Piece At A Time

“I’d get it one piece at a time

And it wouldn’t cost me a dime

You’ll know it’s me when I come through your town

I’m going to ride around in style

I’m going to drive everybody wild

Because I’ll have the only one there is around.” – One Piece at a Time, song from 1976, lyrics sung by Johnny Cash

sign-643551_1920

The United States is a country that was founded by immigrants, and is a melting pot of cultures and ideas. Each year, we welcome new immigrants who enter our country legally, many of whom go on to become naturalized citizens. A foreign born person can become a legal US citizen, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is a process, and it does take time. Unfortunately, there are also foreigners who ILLEGALLY enter our country each year, breaking the law and sneaking across the border. The vast majority of illegal aliens are of Mexican origin. There are quotas for immigration. America is a great country which provides levels  of freedom and prosperity not found in other countries. We are the longest lasting constitutional republic in the history of the world, but we can’t fit everyone. By most accounts, there are over six billion people on this planet, and just 195 countries. One third of these people live in China and India, which have about a billion people each. The population of the USA is about 350,000,000. There are very few people who hate their homeland. If you ask Swedish citizen what the best country is, most likely they’ll say Sweden. A person from Wales will reply, Wales. A German will say Germany, and so on. It’s human nature to love your home, and I love my country very much. I firmly believe that president Trump  feels the same way and is doing everything he can to ‘Make America Great Again’.  There are various pieces of the wall that have been built, that are being built, and that still need to be built.  The government gets it’s income from taxes, I pay my fair share of taxes, and I want my tax money to be spent on the defense and security of my homeland. As far as I’m concerned, if you don’t support the president, you don’t support this nation, and you are not a true American. You should immigrate to one of the other 194 countries, pick one I don’t care which as long as you aren’t living in mine.   

A ‘Mending Wall’

The phrase ‘Good fences make good neighbors’ is a line from the 1915 poem Mending Wall by Robert Frost. The poem concerns two neighbors who meet regularly to repair a stone wall that divides their two properties. The neighbor argues for the wall, stating that ‘Good fences make good neighbors’. Frost counter-argues that there is ‘something that doesn’t love a wall’, and that he wants to know what’s being walled-out and walled-in. That kind of sums up the mindset in the USA currently. One side (which includes most conservatives and Republicans) wants the wall. Democrats and other liberals, do not, and are strongly against it for various ’emotional’ reasons.  Democrats claim there is a small number of people who will be negatively affected, and somehow feel walls are ‘immoral’. Conservatives want protection for our legal residents, barring vicious criminal elements from entering our country. It’s becoming a battle of wills, and I for one am glad our President has the back-bone to stand up to these breeding heart liberals who have been systematically compromising tradition American values. In exchange for funding the wall,  Donald Trump has offered various compromises on other issues that Democrats support concerning DOCA and illegals currently living in the US, but Democrats refuse to negotiate, and try to blame him instead for the government shutdown.  This is now the longest shutdown in our nation’s history.

There is a basic goal of the US government stated in our constitution to provide for the general welfare of American citizens. We are entitled to health, peace, morality, and safety as cited in the preamble to the constitution, and as president, Donald J. Trump has sworn an oath to uphold the constitution and to  defend  our nation from all enemies,  both foreign and domestic. Nancy Pelosi must have missed that part when she read the same Oath of Office.

constitution-1486010_1280

Brick by Brick.

“I’m building a house where I can think

And have some balance and dignity

I’m building a house where no one can hurt me

I’m building a house where the weak are strong

I’m building a house with a real song

I’m using faith that is immortal

I’m building it with simplicity

And the way that we feel, you and me

I’m building it with what I believe in. ” – Brick by Brick song from 1990, lyrics by Iggy Pop

Walls exist not out of malice, but for compassion. They keep unwanted elements out, while protecting what lies within. The locks, doors, and walls of your home are there not because you hate the people outside, but because you love the people inside.  If you believe that barriers are somehow immoral, than you’re very naive and you’ve missed the point entirely.  Piece of mind is a wonderful thing to have and knowing that  one is safe a and secure is an essential component towards that feeling of tranquility.  As always,  I wish you success and happiness!

A Polar Bear Market?

Can Santa tame the beast?

A POLAR BEAR MARKET

2018 has been a financial roller-coaster. Essentially, after a fantastic start, the financial markets had two corrections in one year before entering bear territory in what has been the worst December for the markets since 2011. With one shortened trading week and a day next week left, it is unlikely that the markets will close in the black this year. For nervous investors, this has been a financial heart-attack. The Dow is still in correction but poised to potentially enter a bear market, as is the S&P 500 which has reported that over 60% of its member companies are bleeding red. On Friday, the Nasdaq Composite confirmed that it is officially in a bear market for the first time since 2008.    

A very important thing to remember is that despite the negative financial press, the market is still up compared to where it was two years ago. in fact, before the Dow hit its record in January, it had set 96 new record closing highs since the 2016 presidential election.

Date Jan 3 Jan 4 Jan 5 Jan 9 Jan 11
Close 24,922.68 25,075.13 25,295.87 25,385.80 25,574.73
           
Date Jan 12 Jan 17 Jan 22 Jan 24 Jan 25
Close 25,803.19 26,115.65 26,214.60 26,252.12 26,392.79
           
Date Jan 26 Sep 20 Sep 21  Oct 2  Oct 3
Close 26,616.71 26,656.98 26,743.50 26,773.94 26,828.39

In all, the Dow Jones set 15 record closing records in 2018, and has had over 111 new record closing highs since Donald J. Trump was elected President in 2016. As of the close of business on Friday December 21st 2018, the 52 week high-low range for the DOW was 22,396.34 – 26,951.81 .

For comparison let’s look at the closing numbers of all three US stock indexes for the same day of December from 2016 to 2018

INDEX Dec 21st 2016 Dec 21st 2017 Dec 21st 2018
DOW 19,941.96 24,782.29 22,445.37
S&P  2,265.18 2,684.57 2,416.62
Nasdaq  5,471.43 6,965.36 6,332.99

  

Consulting the data in the chart above shows that although we show financial losses over the past 52 weeks, the gap between the losses is not as great as the peaks and valleys of the highs and lows experienced in 2018, and if you go back another year to 2016, we are way ahead of where we are now vs. then.  

This is why people who panic and pull their funds out of the market every time they hear a negative financial report lose money. This is why it is important to keep records, and focus on the big picture instead of reacting to every negative tidbit that we overhear. If you would have pulled all your money out of the market on December 21st 2016, and put in it a jar under your bed, you would have LOST money. Likewise, when the markets re-bounded in October, had you moved your funds out of the market, you could have locked in gains. As I am an optimist and felt the market would rise even higher in December, I rolled the dice and got craps. Despite this, I have still NOT LOST MONEY, because I am still invested in the market, and the market will rebound again, in time. You cannot time the market. Statistics have proven that attempting to time the market’s highs and lows do not provided as high a return as staying the course and playing the long game. One of the best books I have read on this topic is Unshakeable by Tony Robbins. Market panics are often caused by fools that don’t really know what they are doing. Knowledge is power and the more you read and retain, the greater your potential for success in life. All of the information that I have read indicates that the Dow will hit 30,000 by the end of Trump’s first term, and will hit 50,000 at the end of his second term when he wins re-election in 2020. Make no bones about it, if President Trump does not get re-elected in 2020, it would be a financial disaster for the USA. In the history of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, 10 of the 20 best single-day gains occurred so far under his administration. No other US president has done better.     

  • 03/26/18 +669
  • 11/28/18 +618
  • 02/06/18 +567
  • 10/16/18 +548
  • 11/07/18 +545
  • 03/09/18 +441
  • 10/30/18 +432
  • 04/10/18 +429
  • 02/08/18 +330
  • 04/04/18 +230

I understand that there is a sizable percentage of the population that has been misled into thinking that Donald Trump is bad for America. The majority of successful people would tend to disagree because President Trump is good for business, and business is what drives our economy and creates jobs. I did not become rich by accident, or because I won the lottery, or received an inheritance. I worked hard, studied, and invested my money. I am a life-long Republican and support president Trump 100%. You can choose to love the president like I do, or you can continue to sit in your negative echo-chamber and sulk like some Grinch.

GRINCH

We are responsible for the choices we make in life, and it is a hard thing to change our mind about long-held beliefs. No one is keeping you from succeeding in life except yourself. Not God, not your parents, not president Trump. You!   You are the architect of your own happiness or misery, and as long as you have air in your lungs, you have the potential  to change your life for the better. You can do it, I believe in you!

InstantCoffeeWisdom.com will return on Sunday, January 6th 2019. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! As Always, I wish you success and happiness!

The Trump Effect!

Why Donald Trump is important for our prosperity.

The Trump Effect

There is a failure in the public education system of the USA which has blossomed into a widespread lack of knowledge of economics and civics, and how they are interrelated. This information is necessary to  understand how our economy operates, and is vital to elect effective representatives to legislate on our behalf. Decisions that harm our economy directly impact our prosperity as a nation.    

We have control only over  our actions and what we do or say. We are who and what we think we are, and knowledge is power. If we allow false information to corrupt and sway our thinking, we will be prone to act according to that false data. You may not be a failure in reality, yet if you THINK you are a failure, you will act as though you are a failure and you will have no inclination to improve your lot in life.   Your perception of reality is colored by your beliefs, so it is vital to have your facts straight. Young people are typically “plagued” by political apathy, yet can be swayed into voting by perceptions or feelings of inequality and injustice. Feelings are not the same as facts. Making decisions based on emotional reasons instead of logical ones is a recipe for disaster.  

The United States is the oldest Constitutional Republic in the history of the world. We elect representatives who act on our behalf in the running of our country.  In our constitution, we are granted our inalienable God-given rights of  life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  It is the job of government only to protect those rights. The rest is up to us.  

According to data gathered and tabulated by the United States Elections Project http://www.electproject.org/home/voter-turnout/voter-turnout-data :

In 2016 there were an estimated 250,056,000 eligible citizens who could vote,  and 138,847,000 voted or about 55.5%.  This was the highest by population number voter turnout for a presidential election ever (it was 3rd by percentage). There were slightly higher by percentage turnouts in only two other  elections over the past half-century (2004 and 2008) but it is important to note that these were also reflecting a voting base millions of voters smaller. The highest BY PERCENTAGE in the past hundred years was the 1960 presidential election of John F. Kennedy when there were 109,672,000 eligible voters, and 68,836,000 voted, or about  62.8% .Other than during that election, percentage of voting by eligible voters has been under 60% since 1968. The highest by percentage EVER was the 1876 election which had an estimated 81.8% turnout, and the ONLY U.S. president to be elected unanimously was George Washington.

 A Washington outsider.

On Nov 08, 2016, the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened at 18,251.38, the S&P 500 was at 2,129.92 and the Nasdaq was at 5,154.99. After Donald J. Trump won the election against Hillary Clinton, the major indices began to rise dramatically and have continued to rise since, despite two minor corrections along the way. As of this past Friday November 8th  2018, the indices closed at : Dow 25,989.30, S&P 2,781.01, Nasdaq  7,406.90.

Donald Trump was a Washington outsider, and was elected by a majority of disenfranchised voters who were disgusted by the actions of career politicians.  The mantra and platform that catapulted him to the highest office in the land was Make America Great Again.  Trump promised to bring back jobs, reduce government waste, cut taxes, strengthen our military, and like the slogan, make America great again.  Trump is a billionaire businessman as well as a patriot. He knows what drives our economy and creates jobs. Most politicians by contrast tend to be lawyers with little or no understanding of business. As such, some of these career politicians went on to draft and enact job killing taxes and legislation which lead to the highest rate of unemployment and poverty since the Great Depression. It is interesting to note that Make America Great Again was also used as a motto by another Washington outsider and patriot, Ronald Reagan, the 40th President of the USA whose policies resulted in the prosperity of the 1980’s.

The 2018 Midterm Elections

Crying Hillary

After the crushing defeat of Clinton in 2016, and the appointment of two Supreme court justices, critics of Trump swore revenge and promised a Blue Wave was coming that would sweep the House and Senate making the way for impeachment.  Liberals see Trump as the enemy of America, which is about as far from the truth as one can get. Again, beliefs are NOT the same as facts. Many things that people believe have little basis in fact. There are people who believe in Global Warming despite the lack of evidence to support those beliefs.  There are people who believe in gender inequality wage gaps despite evidence to the contrary. There are people who believe in space aliens and UFOs, yet no one has even encountered little green men from Uranus.

Disgruntled voters often use midterm elections to punish the party in power. The president’s party has lost an average of 32 seats in the House and two in the Senate in almost every midterm since the American Civil War. It’s a time tested fact, and was a given that this would happen. Trump campaigned hard to save the senate and had truly inspiring rallies in battleground states. Due to ‘The Trump Effect’ his support led to the victory of 9 out of the 11 candidates he endorsed. In comparison, not one of the candidates endorsed by Obama for the DNC won. Not one.

I work at my polling place. I can tell you for a fact that I personally witnessed record turnout for a midterm election. It was almost as busy as the 2016 presidential election. We had long lines at 7am waiting at the door. We had the highest numbers of absentee and provisional voters I have ever seen. The DNC had a poll watcher on site almost the entire day, scrutinizing our list of voters and phoning every Democrat in the district. We had an incredible 58.8% voter turnout. The vast majority voted Republican.     

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“It was a big day yesterday. An incredible day. And last night, the Republican Party defied history to expand our Senate Majority while significantly beating expectations in the House for the midtown and midterm year. We did this in spite of a very dramatic fundraising disadvantage driven by Democrats’ wealthy donors and special interests, and very hostile media coverage, to put it mildly. The media coverage set a new record and a new standard”. – Donald J. Trump

In the House, seats that were lost tended to be held by ‘Never Trumpers’ and RINO Republicans. The derogatory term RINO is an acronym for Republican  In Name Only, and refers to politicians who vote contrary to the GOP platform.  The GOP and President Trump are much stronger without these lukewarm associates. Many of the DNC candidates like Alexandria Ocasio Cortez of NY who defeated her GOP opponent are brand new to politics and have no record to stand on. The 29 year-old former bartender turned State Representative is the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, and since winning has complained that she won’t be able to afford her rent in Washington D.C. Her new salary as a representative will be $174,000 a year. That’s four times what I earned when I was her age, and I had money to spare despite eighteen months of personal tragedies that racked-up $50,000 of debt. If she can’t even handle her own finances at 29, what qualifies her to handle fiscal policies for the entire state of New York?      

After the Midterm election results were announced, again the major stock indices rose. The only ‘Blue Wave’ which appeared on Election Day was the one which swished around the bowl when the toilet was flushed.  By contrast, a Red Wave appears to be looming for the next Presidential Election in 2020 which promises to be a landslide more epic than the 1984 re-election of Ronald Reagan. If you are one of the unhappy anti-Trump people, I assure you that the world is not ending, that whatever dystopian horror you think you are living in is NOT real, and that your information is wrong. Reexamine your information, actually listen to what the man says when he speaks, instead of questioning everything he says without hearing a word. Trump is good for America, and America is a great country to live in. Trust me on this. I want everyone to be happy and successful, and that’s why I sacrifice my Sunday leisure time each week to bring you these articles.   Socrates claimed that “the unexamined life is not worth living” because only in striving  to know and to understand ourselves do our lives have any meaning or value. Your life and your personal happiness belong to you and you alone. As Always, I wish you success and happiness.

The Path to Prosperity!

Keeping America Great!

The Path To Prosperity

An Editorial opinion–

“Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.” ― Thomas Sowell, Knowledge And Decisions

Full disclosure, I am a conservative Republican and Christian, and I fully support President Trump. 

We the People of the United States

Tuesday November 6th 2018 is Election Day in the USA this year. Registered voters will be voting across our great nation to elect representatives to legislate on our behalf. With the power of our votes, we have the ability to support or change the current socio-economic state of our country and pass on to future generations a country we believe they will want. Because our votes are crucial to this process, it is imperative that we fully understand the ramifications of our political views, and how they are shaped.  In the USA, our capitalist economy, our religious freedoms, and the laws of our land are all entangled forming a tightly interwoven way of life. Changing one aspect threatens the other two legs of the platform, and many uneducated persons are in danger of making ill-conceived decisions based upon poor information.

“The problem isn’t that Johnny can’t read. The problem isn’t even that Johnny can’t think. The problem is that Johnny doesn’t know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling.” ― Thomas Sowell,  noted economist

in Order to form a more perfect Union

Ayn Rand was a Russian-American writer and philosopher who wrote two best-selling novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. She was an atheist with little use for religion. Although her fiction is interesting and some of her ideas have merit, she really didn’t understand people much because she lacked the critical spiritual component needed to fill the God-shaped hole ever-present in the hearts of man. Although she passed away in 1982 at the age of 77, many libertarians, and some  right-wing conservatives are still intrigued by certain aspects of her personal philosophy, which she termed ‘objectivism’. Objectivism is fully secular and absolutist; it is neither liberal nor conservative nor anywhere in between. In a perfect world,  objectivism might work, but we do not live in a perfect world. Nevertheless, she had some good ideas. She supported laissez-faire capitalism, believed facts were facts independent of a person’s feelings or wishes, felt that reason was a man’s basic means of survival, and held that we ourselves were responsible for perusing our own self-interests and happiness.

UNFORTUNATELY,  many people today lack the discernment needed to sail through the vast sea of information, and lack the skill to avoid being blown off course by the hot air and smoke of certain politicians and entertainers as they try to steer for those islands of reason. Truth is always true, and it can stand up to criticism. If it is YOUR ‘truth’ and you have no evidence to back it up then it is not truth, but rather your feelings based on an emotional response.  As long as you continue to make snap emotional decisions to immediate problems, you will continue to make the wrong choices and will suffer greatly in the long term. I can’t tell you who to vote for, or what to believe, I only ask that you examine your convictions to see why you believe what you believe, and be certain that your ideology is fact based. The road to Hell is paved with ‘good intentions’.

“Socialism is a wonderful idea. It is only as a reality that it has been disastrous. Among people of every race, color, and creed, all around the world, socialism has led to hunger in countries that used to have surplus food to export…. Nevertheless, for many of those who deal primarily in ideas, socialism remains an attractive idea — in fact, seductive. Its every failure is explained away as due to the inadequacies of particular leaders. ” 
― Thomas Sowell

Establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity

Our government is based upon three principals:

  • Inherent rights:  Rights that anyone living in America has.
  • Self Government: Government by the people.
  • Separation of Powers: Branches of government with different powers.

It is NOT the job of the government to run businesses, provide welfare subsidies, or redistribute wealth. Your ‘feelings’ are not the concern of the government.  Its only job is make sure that its citizens are safe, healthy and prosperous. Citizens have a legal right to live in this country,  Illegal immigrants do not. If they entered this country illegally, they do NOT belong here. A country without borders is not a country.  This is a great country and we have the freedom to live as we chose and pursue our own interests.  There is no reason to be poor in this country where every opportunity is available for you to pursue. BUT YOU HAVE TO DO IT, no one can make you do the right thing. According to a report by the Brookings Institute ( https://www.brookings.edu/research/work-and-marriage-the-way-to-end-poverty-and-welfare ) published in way back in 2003, if you don’t want to be permanently poor in this country, you only have to do three things:

  1. Finish High School
  2. Get a job
  3. Don’t have children out of wedlock.

The only thing preventing you from being successful is you yourself. Don’t blame anyone else for your bad choices.   If people don’t agree with you, it’s called disagreement, not hatred, sexism, or  bigotry. Mature adults don’t insult or attack people who disagree with them. 

This Tuesday I will be voting straight Republican. I’m doing this because I fully support the current President, and totally agree with him 100%. In the past two years since he won the 2016 election, my net worth has skyrocketed. To give a comparison, my investment gains since Trump became president less than two years ago  have nearly equaled the total gains earned over the entire 8-year Obama administration.   I dare you to tell me the economy is not booming.

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I am financially stable, I am debt free, I have cash on hand to do with as I please. This includes charitable giving and I am not bragging when I say I willingly donate thousands of dollars each year to worthy Christian charities, and other concerns.

If you are jealous of wealthy successful people, you are in serious need of a reality check. I grew up poor and worked hard for everything I have. I was not poor because someone else was rich. Wealthy people create jobs and opportunities for others, they don’t take them away. There is no ‘white privilege’, no ‘glass ceiling’. They are just figments of the imagination created by the real enemies who want to destroy this great nation.  Don’t allow yourself to be misled by their lies. You can rise to greatness   if and only if you wholeheartedly decide to.

This coming election, ( as well as all future elections ) is about safety and prosperity. President Trump has Made America Great Again, and we now have the lowest unemployment rate in the history of our country and things are getting better every day. On Tuesday November 6th 2018, you need to make the correct decision and vote Republican, it is the only way to keep our citizens safe, prosperous, and free. For the sake of our freedom and for future generations we need to keep the momentum going and Keep America Great.  As Always, I wish you success and happiness.