What big US government

I will never really understand how some Americans think they have big government. Other than their massive spending on defence. Take maternity leave for example. see USA Today here.

The U.S. Family and Medical Leave Act allows for 12 weeks of job-protected leave. This is not paid (accept for a few states). To quote the article 'out of 168 nations in a Harvard University study last year, 163 had some form of paid maternity leave, leaving the United States in the company of Lesotho, Papua New Guinea and Swaziland.'

That is not big government, that is already the smallest state possible.

I have been watching Undercover Boss USA and one thing that runs through each program (apart from the fact that the boss only seems to deal with the personal issues of the individuals and not the company wide problems) is that Americans get almost nothing from their government or their taxes. It is simply shocking how little help the US provides. In this program you see how Americans just get on with their problems. That is commendable but every program throws up many issues which the boss deal with later in the program.

It is not just healthcare but all types of care which is not as good as it should be. It's not as if the USA doesn't have Social Security, its just not very good when compared with other first world countries. We all know about Americas Work to Welfare programs which is much harsher than the Coalitions proposals, but did you know that US citizens only received three months of unemployment benefit until this was changed to two years for the duration of the recession.

So American I just want to let you know that you do not have big government.

USA Social Security Administration can be found here http://www.ssa.gov/

Yes we can't Obama

President Obama famously said on the John Stewart Daily show, "Yes we can but...". 

Obama, oh what hopes the world had.

It turns out that Obama likes to let others push through his reforms and is happy to have them watered down. He only has himself to blame for Democrat voters not flooding out in their droves to vote for his party in the mid term elections. Obama has blown it.

The Republicans and the Tea Party supporters would of attacked Obama and the Democrats with the same vigour with or without Obama's watered down reforms. So Obama should of gone for it anyway, gone the whole hog. It's ok to have enemies in politics. It motivates your own side to and gives clarity to your positions.

However this is not all good news for the Republicans, they better watch out to. Because if the Tea Party are not happy with the new found power that control of the senate may give them then (and I suspect they won't be) I can see the Tea Party running as a 3rd Party with perhaps plenty of Libertarian right Wing Conservative Republicans standing as members of an all new Tea Party.

From movements do political parties grow. You have been warned.