Politics, Simplicity

Unintended Consequences

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The federal government is finding out an unintended consequence of the homeowner bailout they initiated (with taxpayer money). The federal government now owns 200,000+ homes. No, it shouldn’t, but that is not what this is about. It is now spring. It is time for homeowners to mow their lawns. If you own 200,000 homes, you have a lot of lawns to mow. Apparently, it will cost $40 million to mow the lawns. The bailout that never ends. Who pays for the lawn mowing?

And just like that, decisions I have made recently have had unintended consequences. I am forever taking self-inventory to (it is hoped) improve myself. Recently, I decided not to re-up my cellphone plan. Nagging me was how we had gone from an approximately $20 monthly plan for phone service to $150. Sure, the service we received increased. Having a cellphone allows one to receive and make calls from anywhere. Except . . . I don’t talk much on the phone. Sure, Gert and I might swap a few calls a week, but folks who know me know I do not talk on the phone. So we added a data plan. That was awesome! Whenever I had to wait at dance classes, restaurants, etc., I had something to do. I checked in using Yelp. I read Twitter. I checked my news feeds.

But when my phone broke, I re-examined that plan. $75 each month so I could entertain myself while waiting seems excessive. That Verizon Wireless held a gun to my head to make a decision didn’t sit well with me. Y’see, Verizon Wireless no longer offers an unlimited data plan. In order to keep mine grandfathered, I would need to re-up. Same thing with our texting plan. Grrrrr . . .

So I bailed. I am not so important that access to me needs to be immediate. I am not rich enough to have technological entertainment strapped to me belt.

Following that decision, I also closed my Twitter account. It seems to me I was only pushing content to Twitter (Yelp, Goodreads, this blog) and not participating. No one likes to follow the auto-message accounts. I can’t say I blame anyone for that. I was not adding to the medium. But this morning, as I wait for 9:00 to arrive to begin mowing (I was taught not to run the mower before then), I found that I no longer have access to one source of my news. No big deal, as the majority of my news comes from Google Reader. But I just learned that GR has changed. Without a Google+ account (also disabled since the phone went away), I have no way of sharing news stories . . . unless I write about them here. I have restricted the breadth of my network, as it were. I think keeping my thoughts centrally located is best.

So, this is a long post to share with you this post about how the biased media are taking exception with candidate Romney’s claim that 92% of the job losses during the Obama term are women. Yet, it is Romney who is portrayed as anti-women.

If you thought the GOP primary was nasty, get ready for Romney v. Obama!

Also blogged on this date . . .

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