The Final Debate

Dear friends.

The final debate, at least to me, was one that stuck to domestic issues, almost entirely. The questions asked by the moderator, I found to be far better than the two previous ones (i.e., debates) by the other networks…

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Dear friends.

The final debate, at least to me, was one that stuck to domestic issues, almost entirely. The questions asked by the moderator, I found to be far better than the two previous ones (i.e., debates) by the other networks…

John McCain’s strategy began with him speaking to the “little man”, as it were. He was disingenuous, if not deceitful. “Joe the plumber” is not doing so bad economically. This is a man, after all, who wants to buy a plumbing company.

As someone who has owned his own business, albeit fairly small, for most of my adult life (beginning at 18 years-old), I can tell you that the normal sale of a business is ten times the annual income of that business. That means that if a business makes about $500,000 per year, then one needs a loan of $5,000,000 to secure the aforementioned enterprise. Yet, with no more than three or four licensed plumbers, that is a very, very small plumbing business (I have a boxing student who has twenty-five plumbers working for him).

Please do not forget the cost of equipment, trucks, an office, a secretary, along with an accountant – and maybe a lawyer. That does not include rent or mortgage for the office, taxes, and other expenditures. [Note: Retaining a lawyer in such a business is extremely important, as , occasionally, customers make complaints (often times unwarranted), in any small business. For whatever reasons, even if someone just wants a refund in a small claims court. However, many small businesses take their chances in such a legal circumstance and go to court themselves, avoiding a lawyer’s fee. This is especially true of landlords (especially slumlords), for instance.]

In any case, no bank of which I am aware would ever lend such money ($5,000,000), unless they had proof of the seller’s income, as well as the buyer’s assets, because there would have to be a balance sheet that had been drawn up by a certified public accountant (CPA), in order for a bank manager to even consider loaning this type of money. This is not like buying a house. Joe wants to buy an existing, money-making establishment. In other words, because the bank officer is not loaning money to buy a house (a definite asset that the bank can recover if there is a foreclosure), he or she is not interested in “credit references”. Available assets are the only concern of moment - for the purpose of collateral.

What that means is: “Joe the plumber” is far from being a struggling entrepreneur. After all, he did work for these people for twenty years, as McCain mentioned. Moreover, once again, McCain seemed to be showing his absolute disdain for the ordinary American who has no idea of what I just stated above about “Joe the plumber”. Neither did Senator Obama, apparently – nor even McCain, perhaps, for that matter. Who knows? Maybe, that is what his (McCain’s) “advisers” told him to say. If Obama had known, nonetheless, then he would have been able to put that argument to rest the very first time that McCain brought it up. Instead, we had to hear about “Joe”, all evening. Any experienced businessperson, however, was laughing at McCain’s portrayal of Joe’s “predicament”.

Next, when they did move to foreign policy, McCain’s support of lawless Columbia is shameful. Back in 1997, I was invited to deliver a paper at a conference on Caribbean culture in Barranquilla, Columbia, as I had done the year before in Kingston, Jamaica. However, only a few weeks before my date in Barranquilla, I decided not to go, and, instead, sent the paper to my contact there via US mail, after a dear friend of mine told me a story about his experience there (in Barranquilla) where he was told to strip naked in public, downtown, mind you, by five machine gun-toting police officers/soldiers, after he had simply reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet, while asking a native a simple question. (The nonsensical excuse by the brutes for the strip-search was, allegedly, because they thought he had just bought drugs.) That was a lie. He exchanged nothing with the person. It was just because he was an American. I can tell you more horror stories about Americans in Columbia, as well as those from Columbia will tell you about Columbia. McCain calls that country a “dear” ally. Puhleez!

McCain really trumped himself when he came out against Roe vs. Wade though. That did him in; he is done, done, done. He will definitely lose the election now. His choice of Sarah Palin has become more obvious. Even though he danced around the question regarding his support of a future Supreme Court justice, he made it clear that he will not just be satisfied winning this election. Rather, he wants to turn back the clock.

Finally, Senator Barack Obama was far more clear and specific about what he intended to do. Yet, his winning the election will only be the beginning. We must all continue working for a better society. People make the economy, and people make the history. We must build our communities, so that they are loving, productive, and prosperous. Except for scattered examples between the mid-19th and early 20th Centuries, before the government became so centralized, communities here have never been that way. There is no reason to turn back in the other direction. Let us move forward on November 4th.

G. Djata Bumpus