If you are buying this “95% of Americans will get a tax cut” rhetoric, eloquently spoken I might add, that Barack Obama is spewing out, you’re clearly not a smart shopper.  Obama knows the growing number of disciples who make up the majority of his audience and, in his leading role, plays to them impeccably.

I am a middle-income earning wife and mother, one of the two primary groups of people to whom he is speaking, but I don’t dare test his product.  Do the simple math: 95% of Americans will get a tax cut.  But, approximately 40% of Americans live off government money and pay no taxes whatsoever.  Therefore folks, we would be giving more money to almost half the people he speaks about who have done nothing to earn it.  We already have welfare and Medicaid systems in place, and any further charity should be an individual choice—not forgetting that American people are already the most charitable group around.  So, this 40% of government-loving people already receives checks provided to them via our pockets and hard work, yet you want to elect Barack Obama so they can get more…for nothing?! 

Punishing success is a crime, and giving more to people who don’t work, and in too many cases don't intend to work, is an even bigger crime, perpetuating laziness and a "do-nothing" society.  It’s like telling your dog “no,” he doesn’t listen, but you throw him the bone anyway.  Obama wants to throw an even larger bone to lazy dogs all over America and use more of our taxpayer money to do it.  Put simply, we work harder and harder for our families, and he will punish our work, making it easier for others not to work.  Imagine how our welfare checks and unemployment statistics will increase, not to mention the number of irresponsible American citizens.

Benjamin Franklin said, “I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.”  Obama wants to encourage the very thing Americans should be discouraging.  I have lived in east Africa and know what it means to be poor…really poor.  Poor in America means you get more for nothing, and in many cases, have a flat-screened television when your neighbor, who works hard to pay his mortgage and feed his children, cannot afford one. 

In the end, under an Obama presidency, hard-working and self-reliant Americans will be penalized.  If you think Obama is telling it straight, he isn’t. He’s talking in a way Americans want and need to hear it, because otherwise, they would read between the lines.  If you are a respectable and contributing American please do the research before you vote on November 4. 

I don’t know about you, but I have always learned you throw a bone to the good dog.

Jennifer A. Lloyd, Decatur, GA

Writer & Copy Editor, PROOFitASAP.com

Member and Contributor to NDRW (North DeKalb Republican Women)

Today, while the pundits were discussing whether Obama or McCain was more effective in last night’s debate and other back seat political know-it-alls were asking one another who was the clear winner, housewives and savvy grocery shoppers throughout America should have been talking about something else—McCain’s brilliant and forward-thinking comment about ethanol and its effect on the cost of food today. 

First, know that McCain is again the maverick in making this statement, as Al Gore has, in the last few years since his epic and theatrical depiction of global warming, hypnotized the nation and Hollywood, gaining an Emmy, a Nobel Prize and the enduring support of a huge majority of Americans with the need to be a part of something bigger—a greater good, if you will—regardless of whether or not his followers have thoroughly examined the issues. And, because of this, McCain took a chance in talking about something that isn’t, as the general public calls, “P.C.,” yet, something that is a matter of critical importance to all of us…bulls and bears, disciples and vanguards alike. 

Al Gore’s campaign over a still highly-suspect, human-induced climate change has certainly driven something, but it’s not a hybrid—it’s driven up the cost of salty snacks, among other food items in this country, and caused an inflation your typical American, not looking into the real causes, is blaming on President Bush. And, why not? He’s the obvious and usual suspect for those who don’t educate themselves to know otherwise. 

I visited the grocery store to purchase potato and corn chips last night before the debate. At over $3.00 a bag, I declined. Could I afford the chips? Certainly. But, it was the principle…they used to be just $1.50 and now they are over $3 dollars?! Forget it. And, I’m not alone. We are facing the most severe food price inflation in history according to many experts, and our next president must be aware of the problem…must care about it enough to make something happen.  That’s John McCain.

According to Benjamin Senauer, an applied economics professor at Minnesota, "It takes around 400 pounds of corn to make 25 gallons of ethanol.  It's not going to be a very good diet, but that's roughly enough to keep an adult person alive for a year." So why are we talking about people struggling with food costs? Or, as the liberal media puts it, “…people worrying every day about how to buy groceries with a limited paycheck.” Well folks, you can blame a lot—a real lot—on Al Gore and the rest of the ethanol hawkers.

McCain talked about this issue in the final debate—an issue that has, thus far, been overlooked.  But, it is a critical matter affecting all of us, whether high or low income, Democrat or Republican, every day. And it’s time we grocery shoppers unite and accept the candidate who sees the ethanol crisis for what it is—a travesty that must be altered immediately. When the average American sees such prices and blames rising food costs on President Bush, the typical reaction is to think the other side can solve the problem, in this case, Obama. Wrong. Obama supports continued ethanol production as part of his alternative fuel rhetoric, and under that plan, farmers will continue to sell corn for ethanol, getting more money in their pockets, while the corn sold for snack foods will lower. It’s basic supply and demand economics.