I'm Up, and I've Had It.....

Kaitlyn woke me up at 12:30 to let me know we had potty issues upstairs. I'm pretty sure there's a Polly Pocket down in the toilet somewhere. For the most part, our little friends know not to use that potty until Dad gets it fixed (may be awhile), and it works sometimes.... but sometimes not. And those are generally the times that we forget to tell our new friends. So not really sure what awaited me, I trudged upstairs -- plunger in hand.

And was met with a toilet that would really look right at home in some gas station in Mexico.

Which brings me to something that's really been bugging me today. I'm up, after all.

I don't give a flying flip how many houses John McCain has.

For the most part, I consider myself a Republican. Now, there are some places where I'm not as Republican as some of the people we've been to church with in the last year. But overall, I'm pretty much a Republican. I think abortion has some gray areas, and I'm all over stem cell research if there's a chance we're going to need it to save the life of my husband or one of my kids someday. But for the most part if I had to choose a label I'd be a Republican.

I'm in the 54% of Americans who are tired of hearing about Barack Obama.

I watched the interviews from Saddleback Church and really was impressed with how McCain handled himself. And was really quite amused by how uncomfortable Obama seemed at times.

But seriously, I don't know how to say this strongly enough. I don't care how many houses McCain owns.

I'm guessing more than one of them is probably an investment property. In fact, most of them could probably be considered that. When you've got that much money, you need to invest in something. Why not have a condo or whatever rather than having to hole up at the local Holiday Inn when you're in town?

But whether or not John McCain has one house or seven has absolutely nothing to do with this country being in dire straits economically. I think that has to do with two main issues. (God Bless Phil Gramm and McCain for attempting to address this at times. It's a shame they get screwed in the media for attempting to point out the truth.)

1. The media has convinced us the economy is in the pits. That's all we've heard about for the last two years. We're headed for a recession. All that doom and gloom. Listen to it enough and it's bound to happen. It's just like with kids. If you tell them they're stupid over and over, they tend to believe it. But if you tell them they can be anything they want to be if they work hard enough, they shine!!!

2. We are an "I want it, I must have it" generation. Listen gang, I am the worst. If it weren't for Biggsy being the planner he is I'd be riding a Jet Ski into the poorhouse. Seriously, this is a nation where everyone who has the will has a Wii. Every kid has a one of those little hand-held Nintendo DS thingies. Flat-screen TVs. You can't even have a conversation with someone without their crackjack buzzing. We've all got A.D.D. We've all got the shiny object syndrome. We're so busy chasing the latest and greatest. And guess what? There is no way we can afford it. So what do we do? Put it on a credit card. 18% interest? No problem! I'll just switch it to a no-interest card when I get one in the mail and pay it off later. (Dude! I know what I'm talking about! I've been there! I'm not proud of it, and I praise God I'm not on that credit card merry-go-round any longer. It wasn't easy, but it's done.)

But Wait!!! We can't pay off our credit cards because gas prices just went to $4.50 a gallon. So I'll sit here and whine about how it costs $150 to fill up my Expedition EL. What's up with that? We've created the fuel crisis by driving these things. Now it's time to deal with it. Get a bike, for Pete's sake. Or take the bus. Carpool. The price of gas isn't coming down -- not really.

But the biggest grandaddy no-brainer of them all is the mortgage industry and this "housing crisis. " Obama was on TV today lamenting the fact that someone with seven homes can't relate to someone who's barely hanging onto the one they have. I know there are extenuating circumstances sometimes, and my heart breaks for the people who are dealing with the loss of a home. But we could see this coming 7 years ago. When Biggs and I bought our first house in Plano, we paid about $135,000 for it. Fresh out of MBA-land with no cash reserves left, we didn't have any business buying any bigger or better.

But you know what? We could have gotten a loan for much, much more than that. Same thing when we bought this house. We could have bought a way bigger house than what we did. But we wouldn't have been able to eat. Or put furniture in it.

But what happened? That "I want it and I want it now" syndrome took over and people did just that. They bought these big houses they had no business being in -- and they knew they had no business being in. And then, when they can't make the payments, it's suddenly not fair. The mortgage industry shouldn't have "let" them buy those houses. Oh my word!!! Stand up and take some responsibility for your own actions.

But here's the rub. I'm really torn on whether or not I want McCain to be president. There's no way I could be a Democrat. I like it that Biggsy makes a good living, and I like being able to use it. I'm not for giving it away. I'm not for supporting all the bajillions of things the Democrats want to support. I'm NOT for universal healthcare -- the media should really talk to actual people from Canada before pushing that one any further. I think people who are down and out should get off their couches and get to work.

But the problem is that whole media thing I talked about before. If McCain wins, we're going to continue kicking some serious butt in Iraq and be glad we did it. And I think there's a better chance the terrorists will leave us alone -- or at least we'll be listening in on them enough to stop them in their tracks. But in the meantime, we're going to hear four more years of the media blathering on about how terrible the economy is and how horrible the recession is and how it's all the Republicans' faults. And you know what will happen? That will set the tone and everyone will believe them and it will probably all come true.

But if Obama wins at least the media will be all warm and fuzzy. They'll convince us that everything's going great -- and it won't matter one bit that we have to wait to a year to get our kids in to see an ENT because with Universal Healthcare it's all rainbows. And that little housing problem will be history because they'll bail everyone out -- so they can jump right back into a new house that they can't afford. And the terrorists? They won't have to sneak on airplanes. We'll just open the door.