Reviews by Hubie Goode: National Grants Business Opportunity

National Grants
Business Opportunity

The seminar business is in high gear right now, and nothing proves it like the presentation for this opportunity by the National Grants people. Like so many others, they offer a full day of seminaring while listening to what is basically the yellow legal pad sales pitch.

I’ve seen the presentation twice now, and the first time when the speaker told his true to life story, he seemed very sincere and forthright, I will say I was not too pleased to see another speaker this time with the same story and set up. But I understand this sort of thing is the norm for seminars. Always see the same seminar several times if you can, it gives you a better perspective on what is real and what is rote.

This time however, the tone had changed greatly. Due to the ailing economy these folks, like others, are turning into chicken little. The sky is falling ! The sky is falling! You’ll never retire from your current job. Social Security is gone! You’ll have to scrape to get buy the rest of your life! But, we’ve got the answer!

Perhaps they do, but it all comes down to the same idea of free trade and commerce. Basically, the company holds your hand during the process of getting Government grants for various purposes. According to them, there is so much trash that has to be dealt with and considered, the average person can’t get Government grants. There are just too many hurdles to jump over.

For instance, you might fill out an application for a grant in the wrong ink color. Black instead of blue. But only on Tuesday, when the sun is in capricorn is blue favored, no... I am being a wise guy. But you get the idea. Knowing the Government as I do, there very well could be a valid concern for this sort of thing. And there are many examples like this of how conveluted and strange the Government system is, but that would take more space than I am willing to spend here.

The idea is that you join their club, for around $4,000 and become a member and then work with a team of people who assist you in getting grants. You can’t just get grants for any old thing though, and that’s where we run into trouble. You have to be doing something for the Government, say something like improving the community.

Say you want to renovate a bunch of abandoned buildings, turn them into apartments or condos. There is a grant for that. If you have a steel belly for becoming a landlord, then you might want to consider something like this. Done correctly, this could be a boon to the surrounding community, but how much of the money goes to the renovation? Are the renovations done cheap and the cash pocketed? Eh, who really knows, I would hope people could just do the right thing. ... I would hope.

There was no second meeting for this one, no deeper dig I could do at the time. I am, after all , sponsoring this sort of thing myself. I was not able to find too much bad blood on the internet about these guys, and maybe that’s a good sign. All I can tell you is that you have to pay to join their club for services in assistance in getting grants. Can you do it yourself without spending $4,000? Hard to say.

Reviews by Hubie Goode: Where Do I Begin? Part 1

Where Do I Begin?

Arming Yourself for
the Economic Changes Ahead

Part 1

The other day I was watching a local program where several professionals were being interviewed about the effects that the economy has had on their lives. Some where very high ranking business people who had been laid off due to the economy and had to take much lesser positions where they could find them. One such man was a bank president who had to take a job running a flower shop for far less than he had been making per year. He’s actually one of the lucky ones, for many people can’t find ANY kind of work. I saw a letter written to an editor of a national newspaper where the person could not believe that people couldn’t find work. He claimed that his car dealership was strapped for employees and couldn’t find any. I chuckled when I saw this, I know what it takes to sell cars, but still the salesmen sing the same old song of “anyone can do it”. It’s tough to find work because so many people are applying for the same jobs in fields that they have experience in and have credible backgrounds that they can rely on. Businesses searching for employees are looking outside the area of experience.

But let’s say for instance you have been out of work for about a year and a half now, maybe you have sent out 350 resumes in your field, and perhaps you have had 30 interviews, but someone else has been picked. As the form letters now go, “another candidate” has been chosen. It could very well be that the employment world of the last 50 years or so is now over with. Dad or Mom may have pent 40 years with the same company, but that doesn’t happen anymore, in fact, living by the “seat of your pants” has become the norm in our economic society. The days of employer loyalty to an employee are also over with. You could be replaced on a whim at any time.

Going With The Flow

So what’s the new paradigm for work and surviving in these turbulent times? Businesses all around my area, and it’s a nice, high end area where I live, are closing and going out of business. Brick and mortar stores are being defeated by some great unseen force. The creative community also has a real problem with this force. Photographers, Graphic Designers and Video Production alike are also flooded with amateurs who have the equipment for production and work cheaper than a professional. The internet is to blame for much of this, as major companies like newspapers are now going under for lack of advertising dollars due to the ubiquitous existence of computers in the home. We may still have newspapers around for the next 50 years or so, but they will be specialized entities. Your grandchildren will never see a New York Times or a Los Angeles Times, and possibly no USA Today either. Back in the 1960’s when TV produced a new television show, like say, “Bewitched”, the living room was set up with the television as the main focus of the room. Future TV shows will no doubt have the computer in that place, that is, if TV remains anything like it is today. Who really knows where we are going with today’s technology? What will it be like?

For you and me and those generations to come, we had better come up with a game plan that moves with the future as quickly as it changes. The answer to this is of course, education and knowledge. If I am to adapt to a continuously changing environment than the tools for adapting are paramount in my study. The world still moves on its legs of business. Business is what moves the world. So you had better be prepared with the axe, chisel and jackhammer of business. Your kids and their kids now need this information simply for basic survival.

That’s what this ongoing portion of the blog will deal with. Where do I begin? What information will we all need to acquire in order to become recession proof in our own individual lives. We’ll being in part 2. See you there.

Reviews by Hubie Goode: The Old Liberal Three Step

The Old Liberal Three Step
by J.J. Jackson

Anyone who has spent any time at all arguing with a more liberal minded person on issues relating to the powers of the federal government knows the old Liberal Three Step. The dance has been around for the better part of the last century and is the tried and true way for people who have no respect for individual liberty, limited government and our Constitution to justify any and every duty they want government to undertake. Once again we are watching this dance being performed over the issue of Obamacare.

The first step in the Liberal Three Step is to cite the "general Welfare" clause of Constitution whenever a liberal has a "great idea" he or she wishes to implement. They claim that the "general Welfare" clause is such a broad grant of power, because it says the word "general", that it gives the federal government near unlimited authority to do whatever Congress or Presidents can dream up. Of course this flies in the face of the truth not to mention the Tenth Amendment.

The first argument I heard for Obamacare (socialized medicine) was this "general Welfare" clause argument. And I heard it often. But it is easily shot full of holes.

First of all our founding fathers specifically stated, on numerous occasions, that the "general Welfare" clause was not a broad, carte blanche grant of power to Congress enabling them to pass any law they saw fit. Alexander Hamilton, who is often misquoted and often misrepresented as some sort of screaming big government liberal, said in Federalist 83, "The plan of the convention declares that the power of Congress, or, in other words, of the national legislature, shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd, as well as useless, if a general authority was intended."

Hamilton further discussed this later on during the debate over the concept of a national bank saying, "the foundation of the Constitution is laid on this ground: 'That all powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited to it by the States, are reserved for the States, or to the people.' Whence it is meant to be inferred, that Congress can in no case exercise any power not included in those not enumerated in the Constitution."

James Madison, who is considered the father of the Constitution and the preeminent authority on the document for his time, said in both Federalist 41 and 45 that Congressional powers under the "general Welfare" clause were limited. In the later document he explicitly called them, "few and defined."

Thomas Jefferson in his 1817 letter to Albert Gallatin said on the issue, "Congress had not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but were restrained to those specifically enumerated."

Further, it should be noted, that since this is what our founders understood the term to mean and since there has been no amendment to our Constitution which changes this meaning then we are stuck with that interpretation. Anyone see health care/insurance anywhere in the enumerated powers? Nope? Oh well! There goes the "general Welfare" clause argument down the drain.

Having failed at the "general Welfare" argument, liberals then jump to the second step of their dance. They haul out the Interstate Commerce clause. This clause states Congress has the power, "To regulate Commerce ... and among the several States." Liberals claim this gives them a broad regulatory authority to regulate anything that might be construed as interstate business activity. This clause, they claim, gives them the power to institute Obamacare on the grounds that health insurance companies are interstate entities engaging in commerce between several states.

But now let us return once again to the founding fathers and see what they meant without equivocation. In Federalist 22, Alexander Hamilton said plainly that taxes imposed by individual states, at their discretion without regulation, on goods traveling across their territories from other states would resemble the "constant trammels" of the German empire where such acts had rendered major avenues of commerce "almost useless."(see 4th paragraph) In Federalist 42 James Madison said of the commerce clause that its power was for, "the relief of the States which import and export through other States, from the improper contributions levied on them by the latter." (see 11th paragraph) In Federalist 44 Madison again states that the commerce clause regulates only, "the power of the States over imports and exports." (see 8th paragraph)

In 1878 Madison noted at the Federal Convention that the federal power to deal with interstate commerce was limited. He noted that the issue at hand was a state taxing the products of neighboring states that were either to be sold within their boundaries or that were simply passing through them to other states. Such acts would thus inhibit commerce and the free flow of goods. He said, "it would be unjust to the States whose produce was exported by their neighbours, to leave it subject to be taxed by the latter. This was a grievance which had already filled N. H. Cont. N. Jery. Del: and N. Carolina with loud complaints, as it related to imports, and they would be equally authorized by taxes ... on exports."

In the same notes and on Tuesday, the 21st of August, 1787 Mr. Elseworth said that the power of Congress to make regular trade between the states would, "protect them against each other." Further that, "Should this not be the case, the attempts of one to tax the produce of another passing through its hands, will force a direct exportation and defeat themselves"

Here again we see what the Founders meant by the Commerce Clause. They meant it to be a way to prevent states from infringing upon the commerce of their neighbors; neighbors who either wished to do business within their borders or with other states that would require the travel of goods of one state to pass through them before reaching their final destination in yet another state. This application of the Commerce Clause is not nearly broad enough to allow liberals to succeed in this argument that the Commerce Clause allows them to regulate businesses that happen to do business in multiple states.

So liberals sigh and move to the third step of their dance. This third step is to invoke the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. The Supremacy Clause is Article VI, Clause 2 and states, "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof ... shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding."

The liberal doing his or her little dance claims that because Obamacare is now the law that it is de facto protected by the Supremacy Clause and must be abided by. This is a silly argument to everyone but the liberal making it of course. Logically if Congress does not have the power to pass a law under the Constitution but passes a law anyway should it be considered protected by the Constitution? Liberals, of course, say enthusiastically yes. Of course liberals have always been for arbitrary and capricious government.

Based on this logic however certain conundrums arise. First of all think of a bank robber. Robbing banks is an illegal act. But if someone robs a bank and commits this illegal act does he get to keep the ill gotten gains of his actions? If you apply liberal thought processes protecting Obamacare under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution then you are left with no other choice but to say that the bank robber's actions are now legitimate because they have happened.

It is pretty simple. An illegal act is undertaken. That illegal act is successful. So, therefore, that illegal act becomes legitimate by default. Yeah, I know, it sounds so stupid when broken down. But that is in a nut shell what liberals are saying in using the Supremacy Clause to argue in favor of Obamacare.

If tomorrow the Congress were to pass a law reinstituting race-based slavery in the United States, in clear violation of the 13th Amendment, would we as citizens just sit back and say, "Oh well ... its the law you know!"

Hell no! We would not do that.

Of course like any dance, the old Liberal Three Step repeats itself. After having gone through three steps and having their arguments thoroughly debunked and shattered the dancer returns to their home position and begin step one all over again. So liberals start back with the "general Welfare" clause argument again which will be debunked again, then move on to the Commerce Clause argument which will be debunked again, and then return to the Supremacy Clause argument only to also have that debunked again. Then they will wash, rinse and repeat as needed hoping beyond hope that at some point if they keep saying the same discredited arguments again and again eventually these arguments will magically become true.

It will not become true. But they hope to be able to change that reality by a sheer force of will and this is what continues to drive them.

About the Author

J.J. Jackson is the Pittsburgh Conservative Examiner for Examiner.com and owner of American Conservative Daily. He is also the lead designer for The Right Things - Conservative Political T-shirts and his weekly articles can be red at Liberty Reborn.

Reviews by Hubie Goode: Ecoquest Business

Ecoquest Business Opportunity

I watched Ecoquest from a nearby window, so to speak, as a friend of mine actually got involved. I will say up front that their top item, a space age air purifier, is a darn good product. They have many other health related products too, and they all are marketed as MLM. Fortunately, the company has been a round a while, so you have a pretty good idea that they aren’t going away tomorrow. I’ve had that happen, years ago I bought some ATM machines to place in stores, right before the company got shut down by the Justice Department for violations. But Ecoquest seems a stable outfit.

The problem is with the process and, of course the MLM. For those of you who don’t know, in MLM (Multi level Marketing) the system is flawless. One person begats two, two begat four, four begat eight and so on, as a down line is created. This is a great system. It should make millionaires of everyone. But it doesn't. The system is run by flawed people. If you don’t listen to the MLM purveyors, you know that it’s extremely difficult to get to ten down line people, and then the bottom seven are always being changed out again and again. People don’t always work at the same level and with the same competency for making MLM run like a smooth machine. You need to know this, before you pluck down your hard earned cash.

Years ago, I knew some folks who were in Amway. You know these guys, the ones with the circles and the white board. Years later I ran into them and asked them how the Amway was going? Well, they weren’t millionaires and had long given up on the home meetings. This is common, I have found. I have not met anyone who lives down the block from me who is in MLM and owns big houses and boats and vacations six months out of the year. You meet these people at the seminars. You get them on the phone. But never just randomly do you run into them. And I live in a high end entertainment neighborhood in Los Angeles.

Well, back to Ecoquest more specifically. A great product, but as with anything, cost! cost! cost! If you don’t have capital you can’t make these business models run. The sales people never tell you that, they just want to sign you up. But if you listen to all the sales chatter and the handling objections and sales resistance talk, which is all it is... then you will crash yourself. Can you sell? Have you worked a job where it was commission only and been able to make a living? Salesmen will all tell you anyone can sell, but that’s simply not true. Nor is it true that products sell themselves. But salesmen will never say that.

Ecoquest’s air purifier is about $750.00. There is a lot of up line involvement so it’s divided up as much as possible. But, have you ever bought an air purifier for almost $800? It doesn’t help that other in store brands are like $75. This product MUST be sold. Sorry. The concept is to have the customer place the machine in their home for a week or so to see if they like it enough to keep it. Now the machine I saw worked pretty well, as far as I was able to tell. But who stays home all day? Some claims my friend was told would happen when displaying the machine, did not in fact happen, and he was told, “Well, that doesn’t always happen.” A good point since most sales will tell you that the examples used to sell you the product or service is not a typical result. Your results may vary. Which makes me wonder, how they can sell me anything at all??? If you can’t sell me the typical result.... why should I buy??? Freak things happen all the time, sometimes you hit lucky seven, but not everyone does. How can you sell to people with the lucky seven hit when it rarely happens? Do you see what I mean?

Anyway, the machine stopped working after a few months, probably because it was an old display model. No one ever bought one of his machines, the price sent them screaming for the exits. You have to be able to sell, people. And what’s worse, California passed a law against selling anything that creates ozone. This machine only put out about .02% of ozone which was considered relatively safe, but then the machine was replaced with another model the next year, one which did not have any ozone. Huh??? Consumer Reports also slammed the product along with the Government, Ecoquest’s reply was that the Government and Consumer Reports just got it wrong, they didn’t understand the technology. But, changing the machine to comply kind of makes you wonder, if what they say is true.

More power to you brother, if this is your thing. Make it work for you! This is just one man's take and there are many pro and con on the internet for you to find. Just keep one thing in mind for me. Remember that buying a distributorship or home business is NOT the same as getting a new job. You don't buy in and then begin to get paid. A business is and should be treated the same way you would treat a tomato plant.... buy your seeds for one plant, then feed it, let it grow, feed it, let it grow, and then when it is firm enough in itself, get a second one. But all of that will cost you something time and again before you begin to reap returns. That's the natural law of things.

Reviews by Hubie Goode: Batman: Under the Red Hood

Batman: Under the Red Hood
(2010) Pg-13
75 min. Warner Home Video

Genre: Action & Adventure, Animation

Starring: Bruce Greenwood, Jensen Ackles, Neil Patrick Harris, John DiMaggio, Jason Isaacs, Wade Williams, Alexander Martella, Vincent Martella

Director: Brandon Vietti
Screenwriter: Judd Winick

Back in the early 90’s there was a truly great Batman cartoon produced by Warner Brothers that managed to “hit the nail on the head” in getting the concept of Batman correct for a mass audience. The executive producer, Bruce Timm, has been the gate keeper for the animated character ever since. It’s a good thing too, as the animated movies take what is now a classic production and expand in directions, both in expository and in 2-D animation, that the TV series simply had neither the time or advantage of modern tech to include.

Warner Premiere’s Batman: Under the Red Hood is perhaps the most well structured and thoughtfully written installment in the now building pantheon of animated features which build on the past television series. More adult oriented than a Saturday morning cartoon type installment, and darker in its overtones, the convolution begins with story line from around 1951 with the criminal who would become the Joker, the death of the second Robin (Jason Todd), and then continues with the sudden spree of vigilantism being performed on Batman’s turf by someone known as the Red Hood. Students of Batman lore will see the that the light at the end of the tunnel is a oncoming train.

The Red Hood is a ruthless killer who begins regulating the drug trade of Gotham City while muscling in on the criminals who have the territory scoped out for now. A criminal called the Black Mask, who looks a lot like Captain America’s Red Skull, isn’t too crazy about the Hood’s ability to move around his town decapitating members of the Mask’s organization and plugging up the business works. Logically, knowing the Joker and his involvement with “Red Hood” history, Batman heads to Arkham Asylum in typical investigative commencement. When the Joker is found to still be maleficently impotent, Batman heads in a new investigative direction, a more direct one and the first meeting with the Red Hood, with assistance from Nightwing (the first Robin) “smells” like three day old fish. Even the casual fans will not need to be told that Batman is pursuing a criminal with a special “homegrown” edge.

The Red Hood knows his way around Batman’s inner torment too, and this makes him a little more dangerous than usual. He seems to know how to throw Bats a few psychological time bombs as well as some physical ones, and there are quite a few, by addressing old wounds that deal with his history of creating the Joker, failing to save Jason, what Robin’s both present and past have meant to Batman as well as Batman’s personal commitment to Gotham City as a whole. The final scene is a real nail biter, having been built into with mental, emotional and also some physical cache that is pulled off with intelligence and style that can only come from a studio with professional chops that both knows it audience and respects its need for validation.

Action sequences abound and are well thought out ahead of time as all characters involved actually seem to be worthy of field maneuvers on the fly that remind one of classic chess moves along side the bruising physical action. When you say Warner Brother’s animation these days, I doubt that Bugs Bunny is the first thing that comes to mind anymore. Voice acting is well delivered and amazingly directed also. There’s no Kevin Conroy this time for the voice of Batman, but Geenwood gives us a convincing turn and shows the world that Batman is a voice that takes special control and thankfully can be done by more than one actor. Ackles Red Hood is at first a little jarring, but once you get into the story it becomes understood why certain choices were made. It’s the Joker here that surprises. There is no Mark Hamil around this time either, done with great controlled panache by DiMaggio of “Bender” fame instead. I missed the wild abandon of Hamil’s Joker, but on further study have come to see the directoral choices made in the story telling this time as being correct in presenting a Joker who seems a bit more sedate for most of the action. He does, of course, never fail to disappoint in proving to all concerned by the end of the movie his loose cannon insanity which makes him the top tier villain that he is.

It is quite obvious that the movie has a whole back history booklet that is attached to the main story line here, and this gives a heavy air of importance and reality that viewers rarely get in a vehicle which is timed out at say, 20 minutes, for commercial television. Overall a top flight production on all counts which deserves more than just straight to video release, I believe. Not for kids, to be sure, but not offensive in a solicitous way either. This is the thinking man’s Batman. And that final scene, what a doozy!

5/5 Stars