Beware Politicians and Phony Issues - Ignoring the Real ones

We need to raise the level of political conversation. We have Texas GOP candidates talking crazy stuff like rejecting the 17th amendment that allows the people elect our Senators (instead of the legislature)...but saying nothing about real issues.

NONE of them are talking about raising our education levels to compete in this GLOBAL economy and about how to fix our crumbling infrastructure. Instead, its about "open carry" - which reminds me of seeing AK 47's in places like Bolivia instead of here in the USA. No mention of advancing Pre-K or tech training to fill the 2 million high tech jobs Americans aren't qualified for. What about letting our roads fall apart and giving nothing to NASA?

So if you want "more of same" then DON'T read "Agenda for American Greatness." Frankly, we need a real discussion of real issues instead of phony issues like the 17th amendment...

http://bettertimesaheadaprilfool.com/

Citizen Terror in Beijing - China's Coming Rupture? America in the crosshairs

The strangest event just occurred in the capital of China. The heart of the entire country is Tiananmen Square in the capital city, Beijing. In the middle of it still hangs a giant portrait of Chairman Mao, long deceased but still the father of Chinese Communism one-party state.

Today a car with several people in it drove up on the surrounding sidewalk and somehow exploded, burning those inside and killing even tourists on the street at the time.

I have stood where the incident occurred. here is my photo proof.  This crash could be a sign that an earthquake is brewing in China, one that could rock it POLITICALLY for the first time since Mao took control in 1949.

For American complaining about our government spying on us, GO TO CHINA - and see how easy we have it compared to our Chinese citizen brothers and sisters. The Chinese government DELETED photos of the burning car near Mao's portrait from the Internet - which is TOTALLY controlled, unlike here in the U.S. where you can get anything on the Internet.

China has WEALTH. But its people still do not have FREEDOM. It is a kettle about to blow. If you wan tto see the changes, in photos I personally took, check out "Better Times Ahead April Fool"


Standby for developments.

I won't run for Congress, But SENATE I am considering...The Anti Cruz

I turned down a request for run for Congress as a Democrat for one reason -- the districts have been gerrymandered to give the incumbent a 60%-40% advantage. Why bother? Despite all effort, time and money the incumbent will get 60% of the vote. Would you enter a poker game knowing the other side had marked the cards?

BUT running for an entire STATE is entirely different -- you can't gerrymander an entire state. In that case winning depends on things like voter suppression and turnout. I can live with that challenge.

So, I am seriously considering running for U.S. Senate for the seat in 2014 presently occupied by John Cornyn. Especially if a "big name" Democrat doesn't sign up.

Why? Because I have the international expertise that a U.S. Senator needs to make decisions for Texas and America. Lawyers and dentists are all nice people. But if you haven't been in nearly 50 countries on real business (versus going as a tourist), then do you really think you are going into office as a well informed Senator -- when we face economic and terrorism threats globally?

And because I am the only one who has written and published a winning plan to upgrade Texas and American skills and technology leadership.

This is no longer the 70's. We now that we live in a global economy, a space age, high tech economy. I have seen how the world works. I have worked in technology globally for the largest companies and the smallest as an entrepreneur (as told in my book.) That experience has given me the insights of how best America can regain jobs and improve incomes. Before you judge me, you have to see what I saw. Because I saw it from both the top and the bottom. From a farm in Iowa to riding Mach 2 in the Concorde to getting laid off and losing it all. To getting it all back, and founding a small company that has thrived despite the worst economy since the Great Depression.

Unlike the other candidates, or the present Senator Cornyn, I have a written plan to guide America back to being No. 1 again. It is called "Agenda for American Greatness" , the final chapter of my ebook  "Better Times Ahead April Fool."  The title comes from a sign I once saw in India. It became a theme of re-invention. The book describes my experiences, from farm to world, in the first 8 chapters. The final one is about SOLUTIONS (after describing how we got into this mess.)  I have made available a FREE version of it on the book website.

"Agenda for American Greatness" shows how we got into this economic mess, and more importantly, how we get out of it. Texas lags in education when our kids now have to compete not just with kids from other states, but globally. Texas lags in solar power. The present Texas GOP leadership has attacked women, the poor, Hispanics -- and failed to even fund the Texas Water Plan until disaster hit. Today, Texas remains 86% in drought. Every country in the world I have been to provides healthcare for its citizens. Obamacare only requires Americans be insured - far short of what citizens take for granted in other democratic countries from England to Mexico.

The Senator from Texas should have been working to take action on these issues long before now. Our water crisis has been evident for decades. Cornyn has voted against infrastructure investments that repair 65,000 bridges old enough to qualify for social security. I would protect social security and Medicare when international companies are paying zero taxes. NASA is being starved of funding to do work that is vital to keep from falling behind the Chinese in space. Over 2 million high tech, high paying American jobs are unfilled because Americans lack the skills for them. Yet Chinese and Indian workers do have the skills. We should be training Americans for them rather than giving them to other countries.

In short, I would be the anti-Cruz, the Texas Senator whose reckless acts cost the U.S. economy $24 billion and -- worse -- has damaged the United States stature in the world and our credit.

I invite you to review my plan to win the 21st Century for Texans and Americans. Compare it to Senator Cornyn's or any candidate. Feel free to pass it along for comment. We need to have a real discussion on real issues instead of more talking points. Let the debate begin -- AFTER you read "Agenda for American Greatness" -- the latest version is in the book but you don't need to buy it to read the free version at the website.

Follow or subscribe for updates. And follow on Twitter at @Fjet2020

I have been asked to run for Congress - YOUR opinion?

Do I dare ask for your feedback on a BIG decision?  I would like some input because no one should make a huge decision “willy-nilly.” Right? 

Oops, judging from the usual comments I see on articles, maybe this is NOT such a good idea? LOL  

I have been asked to run for Congress in Texas in 2014. Wait for it…

As a Democrat.  Which would be a FIRST. 

But it also makes sense IF I do it. I’ve tried everything else (three GOP primaries to running as an Independent). None of it worked!  LOL.

But I am not sure America is ready for me! You guys want the politicians to tell you what you want to hear. RIGHT? Not what you NEED to hear.  That’s reality.

You never want to hear that you actually have to work harder or learn anything, right? 

See! That counts me out right there. 

But you do need to hear it because China and others are kicking our butts. We are also losing our space race edge—China is due to have brand new space station operational when ours is due for retirement and scheduled to be dumped into the ocean. That would leave only China in space. How does that help us? Watch “GRAVITY” and you’ll see what I mean. If that happens, I hope you know how to speak Chinese. I found it extremely difficult.

America ranks 17^th and lower in education now. Our goal should be returning to No. 1.

I have zero tolerance for talking points. We are losing the global economy. If I decide to run it will only be because people will support it.  I am not interested in painting fantasy pictures of the world that we hear emanating from the extreme politicians produced by the tea party.  These people have not been anywhere in the world. My world is the real world that I was lucky to work in – nearly 50 countries so far – since the 1970’s. From the big to the small.

My experience tells me this: Ideology won’t win the global economy. Only a real plan can do that. I have one. It’s in the final chapter of my book^* entitled Agenda for American Greatness.  Compare it to theirs--if they have one.

Perhaps it was my “50’s crisis.” Some people have a midlife crisis and get a girlfriend. My midlife crisis in 2000 was running for Congress! But I had an important goal: to see that Tom DeLay lost that seat. Why? I believed that I had more expertise to lead us in the 21^st century, that he had been in office too long and had been corrupting the process – even denying Houston over $100 million in rail transit money. That was money that Houston taxpayers had paid for at the gas pump (part of the federal tax on gas goes to a rail-only fund, so it was our money.)  We would be getting it back and improving our clogged transportation at the same time. Once he resigned, my goal was achieved, and I stopped running in 2006. 

Ironically, I made my point. After my first run for Congress, which ended with the March 2000 GOP primary, I was called in to be a Houston TV terrorism analyst (on the local Fox channel) on September 11, 2001. On the evening of 9/11, I was the first one interviewed, followed by Mr. DeLay. I later heard that he was rather unhappy about that.)

After the campaigns against Mr. DeLay, honestly, I was pretty much flat broke. I had hoped I would meet a lot of people and get the policy debate where it belonged – on global issues that impact our future instead of petty politics.

But things change and we have one real choice--pick ourselves up and re-invent ourselves to get things working again. Crying and complaining won’t fix it. Doing nothing won’t fix it. Only action--and focus--pays. 

After losing congressional races against America's most powerful politician at the time, I cranked up my law practice.  But I am not suited for sitting in the same office all day, every day.  I didn’t like litigation versus negotiating global deals and zipping through time zones, trying to figure out foreign signs in other languages. I’d rather be back helping a Texas lady get her girl out of Lebanon than doing domestic legal divorce work and litigation.  

Then I discovered something vastly more fascinating--a security technology that would do far more good for people than I was doing as an attorney. That’s when I retired from thirty plus years of law and established my company, Armor Glass International, Inc., which is doing great things protecting people right here in the USA.

True story--just weeks ago my CPA’s wife was home alone when someone tried to break into the back bedroom glass. The only thing that prevented him from getting in was our security film on their windows. That’s just one of many similar successes we can document (to be illustrated in a new ebook in process.)

Do I want to give that up to go to Washington? Ummmm….

Do I want to go to Washington to listen to Congress reps “blow verbal gas” with their “vast knowledge” of the world despite never having been out of their state until being elected? 

Do I want to listen to voodoo theories of economies when I KNOW how our economies work? I was trained as an accountant at UT Austin. Don’t tell me that “default doesn’t matter” when it kills the credit of a 200- plus- year-old United States that has NEVER defaulted! These tea party guys are now economic and business experts when yesterday they were pulling teeth in Nashville? They think denying health insurance to people is “pro life”?  I don’t think they have a clue.

I was trained in global business by the Fortune 500 – and then was an entrepreneur helping small companies. I have been fortunate. Yes, I grew up. But I was lucky enough to be sent around the world as a global negotiator for those Fortune 500 companies. That required researching an incredible array of U.S. and international laws as well as the cultures of those countries.

When I first went to China 30 years ago, they had nothing; when I went back in 2012, I rode the fastest train in the world, the “MagLev” at 264 miles per hour. China now leads us in seven key technologies. Does Congress have a clue about how to fix this? How many of them discuss training the Americans who don’t have the skills needed for 2 million of our own high-tech. high-paying jobs that are available TODAY, while Chinese and Indians do? How is that helping America win the 21^st century when this same Congress guts our education and technology investment?

Running for any office is a lot of hard work, frankly. Raising money and meeting people at all hours of the day and night, for days and nights on end. The election is a little over a year from right now.  You REALLY have to want to do it. Do I want to do that? I won’t do it alone, for sure.

We have a big problem in Washington. Gerrymandered districts make the election happen in the primaries where radicals dominate. The November voters are cheated out of a real choice today. I have seen it. 

My book ends with the Proverb “Where there is no vision the people perish.” We need congressional representatives who do have a vision. Our success depends on making the right choice in those representatives who have a lot of work to do to put us on the road to success.

I have such a roadmap for America to follow in my book if Americans want to succeed in this new, inescapable, global high-tech space-age economy we now live in. It’s in the last chapter entitled  Agenda for American Greatness. It shows how we got into this mess and, even more importantly, how we get OUT.

But I would like to hear from you. 

If you are interested, my story is in Better Times Ahead April Fool^*. It is also the vision for America to win the 21^st century…it's YOUR choice.  

What do YOU want? 

If you want someone battling for the ALL people in what has become the U.S. Congress--which now resembles a bar fight with broken bottles while the bar burns down--let me know!

LOL.

But hear this. I am NOT doing it unless people really want it and support a Viking like me because I have a great life and don’t need to be battling idiots in Congress simply for an ego trip!

Comments, here or on Facebook…

^* www.bettertimesaheadaprilfool.com 

Comments, here or on FB…

Is there a HOLE in our Airport Security - Or a SHUTDOWN Problem?

Is there a HOLE in our Airport Security when a 9 year old boy can get through the system and on a flight to Las Vegas without a ticket? Did the Shutdown have an impact?

I will discuss at the 7 a.m. hour tomorrow morning on Houston's Fox 26...with my friend of over 20 years, Jose Grinan (Jose joined Fox in '93). Jose, we are getting "older"! How'd that happen? LOL.

My first time at the Houston Fox channel was in 1991 for the first Gulf War (remember that?). Details at:

http://bettertimesaheadaprilfool.com/

GRAVITY - How NASA is saved by... Chinese Space Tech? And Russian ...

GRAVITY, starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney, which I saw in 3D is an EXCELLENT movie that could happen. 

I saw our future in this movie -- and the present. 

It gave me a real sense of what it must be like to look down on our planet -- as Bullock had been jettisoned into space by debris hitting the Shuttle, below her on the screen I could see the lights lining the Nile River leading to Cairo--a place I have been to-- and a silent hurricane in the distance. It gives you a view of the world like no other.

And it was AMAZING to see the different space technology that CURRENTLY exists – American, Russian, Chinese stations and capsules. Because the Chinese were never invited to join the International Space Station headed by the USA they decided to put up there own space station. It will be fully operational in 2020. 

When I first went to China in 1982 as a young legal negotiator for a Fortune 500 company (selling pollution control technology of all things), it was a bicycle economy. Today China is the world's second largest economy in the world and a space faring nation with big plans -- the kind that built America and we seem to have lost. 

Today we fixate on trivial things while the world passes us by in technology and education -- while hillbillies in Congress have no idea how they are sabotaging our leadership in this new high tech, global, space-age economy.  

Reality is not ideology. Ideology won't make us winners when it comes to allowing the Chinese to be the only country with a space station when our space station gets old and is dumped into the ocean a few years from now.

In GRAVITY it is the CHINESE technology at the end that saves the sole surviving American astronaut. I am not giving away anything here other than a fact.  Frankly, the scenario in Gravity is quite possible in the unknown hazards of space work.

 

Female Chinese Astronaut

To create jobs and stay in the tech leader in this global space-age economy, America should double our investment in NASA and make MARS the next destination. 

The hillbilly teabags have such a limited vision – I doubt they know what’s going on outside of Alligator Bayou.  I have seen our Chinese competitors go from behind us to in front of us.  Failure to invest in education destroys our future.

It’s all as fundamental as that. With equality for all, men as well as women. That’s my platform.

I loved the scenes of earth below the action – at one point it looked like the Arctic. Amazing, the whole thing. It made me realize how beautiful it is and how we must protect it from damage.

Space Race countries - it aint' just us bros...duh! Invest or die as the world leader dudes...

My vision for America to lead the future is in "Agenda for American Greatness"

The Real Winner in the U.S. Government Shutdown – CHINA

The Real Winner in the U.S. Government Shutdown – CHINA

Global American Series

6 October 2013

There is a clear winner in the U.S. government shutdown – CHINA.   Our enemies are enjoying the sight of us shooting our own economy in the head.

They are laughing at our self-inflicted damage to our economy and standing in the world.  Because the shutdown has kept President Obama from attending the Asian Pacific conference (APEC) in Bali, Indonesia, China’s president is there touting why the Asians should be working with China instead of the United States. And Asia is listening to China, which has the second largest economy in the world and will have a new space station in 2020 when ours is due to be dumped into the ocean.

What Congress is doing is insane – shutting down the government to block people from getting health insurance. That alone has the world scratching its head. Every other civilized country in the world already provides healthcare to its citizens, even Canada – where Ted Cruz is from – conservatives provide national healthcare.   Our health system isn’t nationalized – recipients still have to pay for it.

Basically our own Congress extremists are aiding the enemy – during a shutdown our intelligence forces are on stand-down.  Our health institute can’t fund research to cure cancer. We don’t have firefighters working to stop fires starting in close national parks. How did we get into this?

Simple:  GERRYMANDERING. It’s the process of designing congressional districts so that politicians pick their voters instead of the other way around. With a computer districts take on strange shapes so that the district is a deep red or deep blue – not purple. That means that the GOP Congress reps are more afraid of being out-crazied by a primary challenger than worrying about a November election opponent. Whoever wins the primary automatically wins in November – screwing those voters out of a choice.

In 2010 these districts elected new Congress reps who had never been in office. They had zero experience outside their home state –so they have no idea that China is beating our socks off. Instead they fixate on the other side of the aisle instead of our global competitors.

I saw this personally as a Congress candidate who ran in three GOP primaries. I thought being the most moderate would be the right way to go. WRONG. One has to run “right of right” to win these contests. You don’t get people willing to work across the aisle. You get extremists who would rather have a bar fight with broken glass even if the bar is burning down.

Solution? Iowa and California have addressed this. Iowa has nonpartisan citizens designing its districts. California has started open primaries, with the top two vote getters making it to the November ballot. It forces them to appeal to the vast majority in the middle instead of the fringe.

We better adopt one or both of these approaches before our own extremists do more damage than Al Qaida ever could.  Pogo was right: “We have met the enemy and he is us!”

My experience with this twisted political system is in the chapter of my book entitled “Predicting 9/11 and Running Against the Hammer.”

Michael Fjetland, BBA/JD

Global American Series

Author, “Better Times Ahead April Fool”

http:www.BetterTimesAheadAprilFool.com

Comment/Follow at our Global American Values blog:

http://globalamericanvalues.blogspot.com/

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Why Robbers Hate Us (30 second video)

http://armorglass.blogspot.com/2013/10/robbers-hate-us-heres-why.html