Withdrawing from Candidacy

Due to my wife having back surgery scheduled next month and my need to focus on supporting her, I’m withdrawing my candidacy for U.S. Representative, District 24. I want to thank everyone for supporting me up to this point.

Tim Rusk, a solid Democrat who lives in Euless, Texas, has agreed to take my place. I am supporting Tim. We sent our papers into the Texas Democratic party today and expect them to be received on March 5. That assures us that there will be a Democrat on the ballot in November for District 24.

I plan to return all campaign contributions in the near future and encourage everyone to contribute to Tim’s campaign once he’s got his campaign/treasurer/bank account organized to accept contributions.

Thank you again for your support.

- Patrick McGehearty

Corporate Cash and Jobs

In the Feb 6 Dallas Morning News Business section there was an interesting article about how much cash the 500 largest companies in America have on hand (1.4 trillion dollars, an all time record) and how much they added to their cash hoard last year (200 billion dollars). To put 200 billion into more meaningful terms, if that money was used to hire people at $50,000 each, that would mean 4 million more Americans would have been directly employed. Don’t tell me corporations need tax cuts to hire people!

What they need is confidence in the future and customers who have money to spend. We need to end the gridlock in Congress by electing people who care more about solving our nations problems instead of opposing anything proposed by the other side just because the other side proposed it.

Thoughts from Vice President Biden

On Jan 31, 2012, I had the opportunity to listen to Vice President Joe Biden give a speech in Fort Worth.

Here are a few points that struck me as worth sharing and remembering for when someone says “there’s no difference between the parties”.

Our goal is to restore economic security to the middle class. From 2000 to 2007, our productivity was up 20% but the middle class lost ground.
In 2009, Obama acted to stabilize the banks and the auto industry. Republicans said “let them be liquidated”. Instead, the American auto industry was saved and is now adding jobs.

The country may have been down, but given half a chance, we will recover.

Americans admire people who make it, but we don’t like being played for suckers. As a matter of fairness, the rich must pay their share. We know that everyone has to chip in. After 9 years of disasterous policies, we know that everyone needs to be in the deal.

A job is about who you are, about your dignity. Its about the prospect to have your own home. Renters don’t care quite as much about the community. The middle class is getting priced out of college, with the average public college graducate having $26,000 in debt or $65,000 for private college. Some might want to make choices of teaching or public service, but they can’t afford those choices.

The Republican party just does not get it. It is the worst thing in the world for a parent to not be able to provide for their children. Democrats are committed to restoring the middle class, which has been declining for 30 years. We want a decent house, good neighborhoods and schools, to take care of our kids and save a little. For that, we need good paying jobs, not a race to the bottom.

A new trend is occuring in the business world, it’s called insourcing. Companies are planning on bringing jobs home from overseas. They are rediscovering Americans are the most productive workers in the world. Manufacturing jobs are coming home. By 2015, there will be no economic advantage for overseas workers. Wages in China are going up 20% per year. And companies have found it was a big mistake to separate the factory floor from research and development. Even call services are coming home. We need to make changes to the tax code to encourage this trend. For example, today a company can take a deduction in the US for the moving expense of going overseas, but does not get a deduction from the overseas country to come home. There are multiple tax issues that work in favor of moving jobs overseas instead of home. These need to be fixed.

Where are the jobs going to be if we don’t lead the world in manufacturing? All the high tech jobs together are less than what we lost in the auto industry in one year. We must retain and build our manufacturing sector.

A one line summary of President Obama’s results: Osama bin Laden Dead, GM alive.

We are for promoting the private sector, they are for protecting privilege.

When judging our successes, compare us to the alternative, not the Almighty.

I believe that the election in 2012 is of critical importance to our nation’s economic future. Are we going to rebuild the middle class or not?

- your candidate for Congress, Patrick McGehearty

Patrick’s politics

Read the following link to see more about Republican protection for the very rich at the expense of the middle class and small business person: GOP set self destruct

Short summary: Democrats propose to temporarily cut Social Security taxes in half to boost consumer spending immediately. More money in people’s pockets will give the economy a badly needed boost. They also propose to pay for that cut by a surtax of 3.5% on those who make more than $1 million per year. Special note: the surtax only applies to the amount someone makes over $1 million. That money would likely have just gone into savings accounts.